The Crab With The Golden Claws
by los.kav
Summary: Modern!Tintin retelling of The Crab With The Golden Claws. The main story elements remain the same, but everything has been updated to modern times, including language, technology, places, and political situations. COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1

**One**

* * *

><p>Fog rolled over the city, smothering the warmth and light like a creeping, almost tangible ooze that sneaked in from the almost-calm ocean like waves: over the dock, making the already wet wooden gang-ways and piers lethal; sliding along the cobblestone streets and dirty back alleys and the more up-market, fashionable parts of the city. Although it was late on a February night, and cold with it, the city was still awake. A few ships had come in that morning, and this place was still dependent on the ships for life: from the jobs the docks brought to the locals to the coin spent by uncouth sailors on booze, drugs and whores.<p>

The pub was a distance from the harbour. Dawes had arranged for the meeting to take place somewhere it was less likely for any of his crewmates to show up. If any of them discovered his treachery he would be dead. There would be no mercy given; no reprieve granted in the name of brotherhood or friendship: they would simply kill him. Drug smuggling was dangerous, and they were all paid well for it. Not a one of them would go back to the old ways of honest, back-breaking toil and poor pay.

"Fancy a go, pal?" A young girl, barely eighteen, slid out of the shadows and stood leaning against the wall. Dawes looked her over: youthful, but with a hard glint in her eyes that spoke of bad experiences; dark hair that fell softly over one eye; dusky skin that looked like rich toffee and even duskier eyes that promised sin.

"Not yet, love," Dawes said. He reached out and caught a hold of the girl's chin, tilting it up. The smoky, fog-filtered light of a streetlamp lit the girl's face beautifully, and for a moment Dawes thought that she was an angel in disguise, sent to forgive him his earthly trespasses. To forgive him for peddling poison.

He'd come back later, when he'd betrayed his shipmates; his brothers-in-arms. He'd take his salvation then.

x

Bunji Kuraki straightened his coffee cup, aligning it to the very centre of the saucer. This place made him uncomfortable. It was small and damp and the patrons looked like an unruly, motley mob. He stuck out like a sore thumb – everyone else in the pub was white and wore working-class clothes – and he'd seen a small knot of drunken young man looking over and laughing amongst themselves, sniggering unpleasantly. This may have been the 21st century, but racism was still alive and well all over Europe, especially in these places where a small-town mentality prevailed. This may have been a city, but it was a coastal city, secluded by choice; separated from the march of time so vehemently that the people that lived there – though tolerant of the sailors and the occasional blow-ins – still maintained an almost hive-like sense of community that viewed foreigners as contemptible and frightening.

If his contact, Herbert Dawes, didn't show up soon, one of the drunken youths would work up enough Dutch courage to swagger over, his friends at his back of course, to bravely confront the quiet, non-threatening, slender Asian menace. Bunji didn't want that to happen. He wasn't afraid: he was just bloody good at karate and wasn't in the mood to slap down ignorant drunks.

The door opened and a stocky, black-haired man in a burgundy cap and navy blue pea-coat came in. He scanned the small interior of the pub, a look of relief washing over his face when his eyes landed on Bunji. He made his way over and sat down, moving his chair so he was sitting on Bunji's right-hand-side, the door firmly in his sights. If anyone came in, he'd see them straight away.

"Herbert Dawes?" Bunji asked quietly. The man nodded. "Would you like a drink, Mr Dawes?"

"Yeah, go on: get 'em in," Dawes replied. As soon as Bunji had gone to the bar to order, he snuck his hip-flask out of his inside pocket and drank deeply. It was almost full, but he emptied it completely, knocking the cheap whisky back in three or four gulps. His hands had stopped shaking, thank God. If he was going to betray his closest friends he would do it as a man, not a snivelling coward.

Bunji came back, setting a pint on the table in front of Dawes, along with a whisky chaser. Dawes took a huge swallow of beer before getting down to business. He pointed an unsteady finger at Bunji.

"H-h-_heroin!_" he hissed.

"Excuse me?" Bunji asked politely.

"I s-said… h-_heroin!"_ Dawes repeated.

"Are you buying or selling?"

"Neither: I'm bringing the damned stuff into the country. You ever seen an addict that over-dosed?" He pinned the Asian man with a fierce glare. Bunji nodded, his face carefully blank. He'd seen plenty of over-doses. Some had been accidental, some not-so accidental, and others he was sure were outright murders but he'd had no proof other than his gut instinct.

"My granddaughter over-dosed," Dawes said sadly. Tears welled in his pale, almost sickly eyes. "Beautiful girl. She could have been anything she wanted. We're still not sure why she"- he paused and looked away. Bunji sipped his coffee, waiting until the man had composed himself.

"Do you know what it's like?" Dawes hissed when he had stemmed the flow of tears. "What it's like, living every day knowing that you brought in the shit that killed your only granddaughter? Your own flesh and blood?" He downed the pint in one go, his natural belligerence mixing with the drink to fuel his desire for justice. That's what this was about, after all: atonement. The desire to get caught, at last; to pay for his granddaughter's death, as though by punishing himself and his crewmates he could deliver justice to the dead girl and others like her. The nameless, faceless, growing number of statistics that he was helping to kill.

_May God have mercy on me. _

"I'm sorry for your loss," Bunji said.

"Yeah," Dawes said with a sneer. "Don't make me laugh. Your type looks on lads like me like we're scum. Well, we're not. We just wanted to earn some money, pal. Where's _our_ economic boom? I'll tell you where: in the pockets of fat-cats! We risk our lives day after day _– year_ after Godforsaken _year_ – shipping goods all over the world, and what do we get for it? A pittance and the back of your hand, that's what!"

Bunji shook his head. "You're mistaken, Mr Dawes: I don't think you're scum at all. Far from it. I think you're a hard-working man that saw an opportunity and took it. After all, junkies will get their junk, won't they?"

"S'right," Dawes agreed.

"You might as well make some money out of it. After all, if not you and your ship, then someone else will do it, right?"

"Yus! Exactly!"

"What makes you a _good_ man, Mr Dawes, is your wish to repent."

"_Yes!"_ Dawes put his head in his hands. "Oh, Lord forgive me!"

"Tell me about it, Mr Dawes." Bunji leaned in closer. Someone had just turned on the jukebox and Nancy Sinatra was singing about her famous boots.

"Crab," Dawes said, his hands muffling his mouth. Bunji frowned, annoyed by the gradual loudness that was building around them. A table of drunken women – hard-faced slappers in too-short skirts and towering leather boots – had joined with Nancy in female solidarity, and were shouting the words to the song over her smoky, seductive drawl. "What?" he cried, raising his voice.

_**These boots were made for walkin'**_

"Crab!" Dawes raised his head and reached into his coat. Bunji stiffened, aware that the man was drunk enough to be dangerous with a weapon.

_**And that's just what they'll do**_

Dawes pulled out a tin. It was roughly the size of a decent tin of baked beans, but had a garish yellow label with a red relief of a crab on it. He tossed it onto the table and it rolled towards Bunji.

_**One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you!**_

The heavy bass line thrummed, the floor vibrating subtly underfoot. Bunji turned the can over in his hands: it was empty, and the peel-away lid had been, well, peeled away, showing the dull tin inside. He flashed it at Dawes, one eyebrow arched.

_**That's it, boots, git on walkin'!**_

"I can get you a full one," Dawes shouted over the din. The women were really having a good time now, stamping their feet and shouting along with the jazz section of the song. Bunji supposed it was just one of those songs, along with _I Will Survive_, that all women know the words to. It was genetically coded in them, and released itself after their first tough break-up.

"Do," Bunji agreed. He tossed the can back to Dawes. It was of no use to him: any fingerprints on the can were compromised the second Dawes had shoved it into his pocket, and the heroin would have been placed inside plastic wrappers first. He knew from experience that forensics would yield nothing. "What ship did you say?"

He saw Dawes mouth move, but the words were stolen by the din around them. Some of the women were up and dancing, shaking their bodies in a vulgar display of sexuality, and the men were starting to hoot and clap. Bunji shook his head and gestured to his ear.

Dawes rolled his eyes. He tore a strip off the can's label and leaned over to steal a pen from Bunji's shirt pocket. He scribbled something on the paper and showed it to the Asian man. One word; _Karaboudjan. _

_Karaboudjan! _Bunji's eyes widened. _He had been right! _All his instincts had screamed at him that the _Karaboudjan_ was involved somehow, but he'd ignored them after he'd met the captain of the vessel. The man had been a complete arse! What was his name again? Trout? Salmon? Haddock? Something fishy like that, anyway. They'd nicknamed him The Red Herring, because they'd thought he'd just been a blustering drunk that had lost his mind somewhere along the way. If Dawes was right, then The Red Herring was a phenomenal actor.

Dawes screwed up the piece of paper and shoved it into his pocket. The song finally ended, to much applause and cat-calls, and after a short moment the noise died back down to a steady, good-natured buzz, and the two men could finally hear each other again. They leaned back in, conspiratorially.

"You know the old church yard?" Dawes asked.

Bunji frowned. "Beside the Town Hall?"

"_Nah!"_ Dawes waved his hand dismissively, almost knocking Bunji's glasses off. "There's one on the edge of town, over the bridge. Old plague graveyard, where they just used to toss the bodies in together. It's always deserted. Meet me there at noon tomorrow and I'll have the proof you need."

"All right, Mr Dawes, I'll meet you there." Bunji stood up and pulled his black greatcoat on.

"Here!" Dawes reached out and grabbed Bunji's sleeve. "What'll happen to me?"

"Don't worry, Mr Dawes. I'll see that you're taken care of."

"God bless ya, mister." He toasted the Asian man with the whisky shot and downed it in one gulp. When Bunji was gone, he got to his feet and made his way unsteadily out of the pub. If he was lucky, his angel would still be in the alleyway and he could buy his redemption with coins and kind words.

_May God have mercy on me._

x

He staggered off, the fog swallowing him, blind to his surroundings. Behind him, two men followed him out of the pub, eager to catch up with him. Their suspicions had been correct: Dawes had proven to be the weak link in the chain, and it was time to silence him.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's note:<strong> I had no intention of updating any of Hergé's completed stories, but someone mentioned that they'd like to see this done in the comments for one of the other modern Tintin stories (I forget which) and the idea wouldn't go away. I'm still not sure about it though: it could work - it's working so far - but I don't know if there's any demand for it or if anyone else would like to see it updated. Modern Tintin is really about the bromance between Haddock and Tintin, and this story is the start of this wonderful bromance.

For now, this story will be a one-shot. If there's enough reviews asking for it to be completed, I will definitely revisit it (probably after Alph-Art is finished) and continue with it. If not, then it can remain a one-shot and fade into abandonment like a good little story. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. So please, let me know what you think and if you would like to see it updated or not.


	2. Chapter 2

****Obligatory disclaimer:** **Tintin and Co do not belong to me. They belong to Moulinsart, and if they catch us they'll make us pay so everyone keep calm and remember to turn the lights off before reading this story.

* * *

><p><strong>Two<strong>

_Coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous_ - Albert Einstein

* * *

><p>Three hours until his train left. That wasn't so bad, Tintin reflected. His trip to Nieuwpoort had been a bust so far, chasing leads that had stagnated during his time in Syldavia, but at least now he had some time to do a bit of shopping. He could even go down to the harbour if he wanted to, and watch the ships. He loved docks and harbours of all sorts: when he was younger he'd harboured romantic notions of running away to sea, but they'd been scuppered. Now, whenever he had the chance, he would go to harbours to watch the ships, or just to people-watch. The sailors and the dock workers were so interesting to him, especially the sailors: they had the best stories and he enjoyed listening to them.<p>

He strolled along a wide street, enjoying the feel of a new city – he loved to travel, even if it was just to another part of Belgium – and Nieuwpoort had proven to be a beautiful city. Its cobblestones and old-world buildings gave it the look of an illustration from the lid of a box of Christmas cookies. It had performed the marvellous trick of being a large, prosperous city while retaining the charming air of a fishing village.

It was like something out of an Enid Blyton novel. If he tried hard enough, he could almost imagine the _Famous Five_ sprinting around the corner, hot on the heels of some smuggler or other.

The buildings on either side of the road were old dock-workers' houses: small, cosy townhouses; two up, two down with a front door that opened straight onto the street. It must have been bin day, he realised, because the very edge of the pavement was cluttered with various bins. Beside most sat small, grey plastic boxes filled with recyclable waste: part of the EU's concentrated efforts to make every country in the Union ecologically aware and Belgium, for obvious reasons, was attempting to lead the way.

Caught in his own thoughts, Tintin paid little head to his companion: his small, white Wire-Fox terrier, Snowy. Lost in the unfamiliar smells of a new place, Snowy paid little heed to his owner. He was, in his own estimation, a rather independent dog. Well, as long as Tintin was nearby he was independent, anyway. Nose pressed firmly to the pavement, he snuffled along, body firmly following his olfactory senses as he wandered hither and thither, allowing a gap to open itself up between man and dog as Tintin continued on at a steadier pace.

Known fact? Cats love fish.

Lesser known fact? Dogs love fish too.

For Snowy, it had started innocently enough with tuna fish: Tintin was in the habit of being generous with his sandwiches and Snowy wasn't about to protest that (sometimes, they were chicken sandwiches. This was called a Good Thing, and pleased Snowy greatly). Tuna had become a firm favourite with both man and dog, and noting his dog's fondness for fish Tintin had made the mistake of giving Snowy a tin of salmon once, when he'd run out of dog food and the shop was already shut. Since then, Snowy had turned up his petite, black nose at the lesser tuna, and only accepted salmon or better. But now… Oooooh, _now!_

That tantalising smell! That fresh, _oily_, fishy smell! The aroma of rich meat and salt! _Ambrosia!_ He must have it! All thoughts ceased to think and he became driven by scent alone. He sniffed the air, his fine nose attuned to the powerful whiff and deduced at once that it came from one of the grey recycling boxes set alongside the dustbins. Heedless of any danger, he plunged his head into the box and managed to find the thing that smelled so tasty. Digging in further, all light was lost from view. Spooked by the sudden dark and the strange, pinching tightness around his precious nose – favourite of all his limbs – he pulled back and found that the Dark came with him.

x

Disturbed from his reverie by an disconsolate yowling, Tintin stopped and looked around for Snowy. The dog was staggering drunkenly, attempting to follow Tintin while at the same time trying to dislodge an old can that was caught over his nose.

"How on earth did you manage _that?" _Tintin hurried back and grabbed the dog, pulling the can free. "Will you _stop _digging through crap, please! I swear, I should change your name to Oscar the Grouch, you spend so much time in bins!" He tossed the can, an old crab tin, the label half torn away, back into the recycling box and hooshed Snowy away with his foot. "No, Snowy, _enough!_ Or I'll put you on a lead!"

Snowy settled down at once: he knew what the word 'lead' meant, just as he knew the words 'dinner', 'chicken' and 'walkies'. But unlike the other three, 'lead' was a Bad Word. Any time Tintin said 'lead', he would produce the long stringy thing, and it meant that Snowy was going to the Vet. The Vet was another Bad Word. Snowy didn't like the Vet: he was violently opposed to people that pushed _things_ up his bottom. Eager to avoid such a thing, he stuck close to Tintin's heel like a Good Dog.

Still heading towards the harbour, Tintin passed a small pub without really seeing it.

"Tintin!" a voice hailed him. He turned to see Thompson, one half of Interpol's curious double-act the Thompsons (almost identical, but otherwise no relation to one another) leaning through the door of the _Olympia Bar_ and waving at him. His almost-completely identical partner, Thomson, was sat at the window looking out and also waving.

Well, there were worse ways of spending a few spare hours than in a pub with them, that was for sure: they were serious men with a comical air and a surprising propensity for accidents. For some reason, they had taken a liking to Tintin and sometimes fed him information. Granted, they benefited from including him in their investigations – they got the criminals at the end – but so did he, in the form of exclusive stories and interviews. It was an arrangement that worked well for both parties.

He happily crossed the road and joined them inside the pub.

"Have a drink?" Thomson offered, already gesturing to the waiter.

"Half a pint," Tintin replied as he shook off his jacket and sat down. The waiter nodded and disappeared into the general throng, which seemed to be mainly made up of professionals tucking in to carvery lunches.

"How are you?" Thomson asked, slapping Tintin on the back so hard that it stung, even through the thick, blue hoodie Tintin wore.

"Haven't seen you since Syldavia," Thompson added. He too slapped Tintin on the back, managing to get him in precisely the same spot as Thomson.

Slightly annoyed, Tintin waited until they had both raised their pints for a sip. "Good to see you both!" he declared, slapping them into the froth. Revenge duly taken, he settled back for a chat. Snowy sat close to his master's feet: tables usually meant food and chicken was food. At any moment now a chicken could materialise, and Snowy didn't want to miss it.

"So what's up?" Tintin asked. It never hurt to dig a little with the Thompsons. "What brings you two here? It's hardly crime-central."

Thomson leaned in. "Forged bank notes," he said. Both Thompsons tapped their noses.

"Oh, yes, I heard about that." It had been on the news over the last couple of days: an explosion in forged euros all over Belgium and other parts of the Euro Zone.

"With the housing markets crashing, people are getting desperate," Thomson said. "There's less money being earned, so some smart-arse usually turns to forging."

"Not just euros, either," Thompson added. "We traced a load of Sterling bank notes to Nieuwpoort too: analysis shows that the paper used in both the pounds and the euros are the same, and are only shipped by one company to Nieuwpoort."

"Huh." Tintin was thoughtful for a moment. "How easy is it to spot the fakes?"

"Remarkably," said Thomson.

"If you have a good eye," added Thompson.

"But because of the boom, the shop keepers are in the habit of only checking larger notes, like the €50's and €100's."

"And all the notes we've found so far have been in smaller denominations: €5's, €10's and €20's. If they only ran their infrared lights over them, they'd see the difference at once."

The waiter reappeared and placed a half a pint of beer in front of Tintin. "€3.20, sir."

"I'll get this," Thompson said generously, handing over a €5 note. The waiter held it up to the light, checking the watermarks.

"Is that necessary?" Thomson asked, affronted on his partner's behalf.

"Sorry sir," the waiter said, "but it's a fake."

"_What!"_ Thompson snatched the note back and examined it. "Bloody hell! It's a dud!"

"Just goes to show you," Tintin said as he paid for his drink, "how easy it is to make a mistake."

"Look at the silver-strip," Thomson said, peering at the note over Thompson's shoulder. "That's different from the others."

"A new batch?" Thompson mused. "Tintin, we shall have to love you and leave you, as the saying goes. We're going back to our temporary office to examine this more closely."

Tintin checked his watch: still two hours till his train left. "Mind if I come with you?"

"No, I don't see why not. Drink up and come on."

x

The Thompsons' temporary headquarters was at the back of the local municipal buildings, in a smart prefab that over-looked the winding, affluent neighbourhood near the beach. The office itself was untidy, the desk overflowing with paperwork, reports, all sorts of files, and the general disarray that usually accumulated on unsuspecting flat surfaces.

Magazines and reference books sat side by side, vying for space with interview transcripts and shipping manifestos, and the In-Tray contained very little in the line of 'in'. Instead, it held an old key, some crispy, twice-dried, faded euro notes, a half a packet of cigarettes and a vaguely familiar scrap of paper.

"Hey, where did you get this?" Tintin asked curiously. He picked up the scrap of paper, which was the torn label of a crab can. It was yellow with half a red crab on it.

Thomson and Thompson, who were adding to the mess by rummaging furiously through the debris, gave the label a cursory glance. "That?" Thomson said. "They took a body out of the water this morning. Everything there was found inside his pockets. They bumped it over to us because, if you look closely, all those notes are fake. Interesting, isn't it?"

"Yeah, really interesting," Tintin lied absently. _There's no way this could come from the same can… Could it? _"I'll be back in a second," he added, before sprinting out of the room.

The Thompsons looked at each other. They knew from experience that whenever something like this happened, Tintin was about to solve their case for them. They also knew that the best way to deal with it was to hang on tightly for the duration of the ride and take all the professional glory at the end.

They caught up to him on a residential street. When he heard their shouts he finally slowed down and they managed to catch him up.

"What's bitten you?" Thompson demanded.

"Just a hunch," Tintin replied. "This paper" – he opened his fist and showed them the yellow and red label – "came off a particular can. I'm almost sure of it. In fact, I'm almost sure I was holding that same can in my hands right before I met you two."

"So?" Thomson asked, confused.

"So! So I don't like coincidences. They happen to often to be coincidental. But don't worry: it won't take up much more of your time. I threw it in a bin up ahead. There: where that old man is standing."

Ahead of them, a rather flea-bitten old man carrying a burlap sack was bent over the recycling box. Whether he was an eco-warrior ensuring that everything was properly recycled, or an old tramp, was anyone's guess.

"Sorry!" Tintin said cheerily. "I think I threw something away by mistake." Ignoring the man, he dropped to his knees and started digging through the box. After about a minute and a half he sat back and looked up at the Thompsons. "Gone," he said, disappointed. "I _know_ I tossed it back in there."

Thompson rolled his eyes and turned to the old man. "I can't believe I'm doing this, but would you mind opening your bag, sir? My friend here has lost his empty tin of crab. Or his mind. We're not sure yet."

Bewildered, the man offered his sack to Tintin, who quickly went through the old garbage it contained. "Nope," he said with a sigh, "not here either."

"I'm sure it wasn't important," Thomson said consolingly.

"To be precise, just a coincidence," Thompson agreed as they walked away from the old man. Behind them, the tramp was joined by a well-dressed Asian man who watched the three closely.

"What was that about?" Bunji asked.

"I have no idea," the old man replied. "They were looking for an empty tin of crab. Of course, you know what that means, don't you?"

"No," said Bunji thoughtfully. _The younger of the three… Isn't that Tintin, the reporter? How very interesting._

"It means that our supreme over-lords, the Crab People, are coming. They are raising Leviathan, mark my words!" He took a small skull-cap made of silver foil out of his pocket, and put it on under his regular hat. "Can't be too careful," he added as he heaved his sack onto his back, "_they_ might be listening."

"Maybe they are," Bunji agreed quietly, watching as Tintin and the Thompsons turned the corner. "Maybe they are indeed."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Updates should be once a week or thereabouts. I hope you enjoy it!


	3. Chapter 3

**Three**

* * *

><p>An hour 'till his train left. Tintin returned to his hotel and puzzled over the scrap of label a bit more. The more he stared at the back of it, the more he was convinced that there was something written on it. But like the forged notes, the paper was crispy from being dried and everything was faded. Whatever had been written there was now gone: washed away by the ocean.<p>

Hmm. Well, it was worth a try. He left the label down on the dressing table and opened the door, hanging a 'Do Not Disturb' sign on the outside. Next, he took his iPad out of his bag, intent on using the powerful camera as a make-shift magnifying glass. Snowy nosed over on the off chance that chicken would be produced, an old bone held firmly in his chops.

"Ugh! Snowy, where on earth did you dig that up from? That smells foul!" Tintin tugged the bone away from the dog and stood up. "Stop eating trash! It would serve you right if it was poisoned or something horrible." He absently tossed what he thought was the bone into the wicker waste-paper basket that sat beside the bathroom door while suppressing a shudder. People were cruel, and there were sickos out there that got their kicks from putting poisoned food out for strays.

Back to the bed, and the piece of label was gone. he stood looking at the bed for a few seconds. Then he tossed what he thought was his iPad onto the bed and searched his pockets. Then he searched his bag. Then the bathroom, on the off chance that he'd put it down in there absentmindedly and had forgotten about it.

"Ok, this is getting ridiculous," he said aloud. "Ah! Outside!" He remembered putting the sign on the outside of the door. _Could I have dropped it?_

He pulled the door open and looked out into the hallway. Behind him, there came a sudden bang. Startled, he jumped and looked around to see that the bathroom door had slammed shut.

"Oh! The window's open!" he said. "That means…" He closed the door of his room and dropped to his knees. "The paper must have blown away. And here it is!" He had found it at last, hidden beside the skirting board next to the dressing table. He picked it up and reached for his iPad on the bed.

It was gone.

He stared, puzzled, at the yellow eiderdown, positive that his black iPad would show up against the brighter colour with even the most cursory glance.

"Ok," he said slowly, "I think I've gone mad. And now I'm talking to myself. Yup: I'm crazy."

Snowy jumped up, bracing his front paws against Tintin's leg. The iPad lay at his feet.

"Well done, Snowy!" Tintin said, giving the dog a scratch on the head. He picked up the iPad and brought it, along with the label, to the dressing table, which was the only hard, desk-like surface in the room. Unbeknownst to him, Snowy retreated under the bed to work on the misplaced bone.

Using a pencil, Tintin quickly and lightly traced over the part of the label where he thought he could see indentations in the paper. Soon, a single word stood out against the grey marks of the pencil: _Karaboudjan. _

"What on earth is a karaboudjan when it's at home?" he wondered. A few taps on the iPad confirmed it as being a Turkish-Armenian word, that roughly translated to _This Black Spirit_ or _My Black Spirit_. "Not very helpful," he said with a sigh. Outside the window a car screeched to a halt. Tintin stood up and looked out when the shouting started. Someone screamed, but by the time he got to the window a blue car – _too far away to see the number plate, worse luck_ – was pulling away, and two men were chasing after it and shouting angrily. Someone else was shouting for the police to be called.

He hurried down to the lobby, Snowy at his heels. It wasn't an expensive hotel, and it had a very small lobby: just the reception desk and a couple of armchairs set around a coffee table. A middle-aged woman with black hair was sitting on one of the chairs. A small crowd of people had clustered around her. When she saw Tintin she cried out to him, and he recognised her as the receptionist.

"Sir! Oh, sir! A man – he was Chinese or Japanese – just came with a letter for you, Mr Tintin. He was just about to give it to me when a car came up and a load of men jumped out. They burst in here and grabbed the Chinese fellow and pulled him outside! I was screaming for the police, and these gentlemen here tried to help, but it was over so quickly! They pushed the Japanese fellow into their car and took off! With your letter too!"

"Has anyone called the police?" Tintin asked. They had, but it was still worth it to phone the Thompsons too. He stepped outside to get away from the noisy lobby, and Snowy relieved himself against a street lamp.

"Hey!" Tintin said when Thomson answered. "A man has just been kidnapped from my hotel. He had a letter for me, apparently."

"Was he Armenian?" Thomson asked quickly.

"What? No! He was Asian."

"Hmm. Shame. We just identified the sailor they pulled out of the sea this morning: Herbert Dawes of the _Karaboudjan_."

"Wait, did you say _Karaboudjan?_" Tintin asked excitedly.

"That's right. We're just heading down to the docks now: she's not due to depart until later today."

"Can I come with you? I'm, uh, doing a piece on boats and ships. I just want to take a few photos or whatever."

"Sounds all right by me," Thomson replied. "Meet you there in about twenty minutes."

x

A few taps on his phone confirmed a second train leaving Nieuwpoort for Brussels an hour and a half after the first. Tintin quickly switched his ticket to that service and made his way down to the docks. With luck, the trip might not turn out be a total bust, as he had first thought.

He found the _Karaboudjan_ easily enough by asking around. He was directed to it, but when he got there he still couldn't see any sign of Thomson and Thompson among the busy, industrial dock workers. Crates and boxes were being loaded and unloaded all around him, the clever metal pulleys hoisting the huge containers with ease in and out of the cargo hold in the belly of the ship. Foreign words and voices, mixed with good-natured banter, accompanied the work, and above this floated the ever-present noisy sounds of gulls.

And what seagulls they were! So many of them, flocking to the air above the docks, perching here and there on the tall rigging before taking flight once more with their constant calls and chatter. Their guano covered everything.

Tintin stopped for a few moments, enjoying the scene. There was something fundamentally fascinating about birds: their delicate form married to their ruthless nature; the supreme grace and ease they rode the sky; their quick intelligence… Was it any wonder that a man like Leonardo Da Vinci could spend a lifetime in envious observation, hoping and dreaming of a time when men could mirror them and soar as high as Icarus, without the heartbreaking down-fall?

The gulls swooped and called to one another, and Tintin found his eyes following their dance. Up and up, and over and around, and _Great snakes!_

He dove out of the way, shoving Snowy brutally with his foot as a huge wooden crate crashed down on the very spot where he had been standing scant seconds before. The wood burst open with the impact, scattering tins of sardines over the ground, and Tintin soon found himself surrounded by a horde of anxious dock workers and the late-arriving Thomson and Thompson.

Confused and baffled, much was made among the dockers about how such a healthy chain could snap so easily, and Tintin found himself thanking his lucky stars that he was so distracted by the birds.

"If I wasn't watching them…" he said with a shiver.

"Don't think about it," Thompson advised with a grimace. "Come on; the first mate of the _Karaboudjan_ is expecting us."

x

First Mate Allan hissed angrily through his teeth. "Damned lucky," he snapped. "And he's coming aboard. Right." He turned to his companion, a tall, barrel-chested man named Tom. "Take care of it. He doesn't go back ashore. I'll deal with the pigs. Got it?"

"_Got it_ as in kill him?" Tom asked.

"No, just knock his ass out. Dump him down in the hold until we get our orders."

"Gotcha." Tom wasn't surprised by his lack of scruples any more: he had a huge mortgage to pay and his wife wanted a new kitchen. He wasn't about to let some snot-nosed kid stand in _his_ way.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> I don't particularly like iPads, but I just couldn't see any reason why someone would take a magnifying glass to a hotel, without turning the story into smut. On the other hand, there's an app that turns your iPad's camera into one. Need to change your train ticket? There's an app for that too. Maybe. Probably.


	4. Chapter 4

**Four**

* * *

><p>Tintin waved his camera vaguely at Thomson and Thompson. "I'll meet you back here in about half an hour, yes?" They were standing on the deck, just in front of the gangplank.<p>

"Sounds fine," Thomson agreed. Tintin walked away as Allan approached. Now, the First Mate was full of smiles and welcomes as he held his hand out.

"Allan Thomson," he said genially. "First Mate of the _Karaboudjan_. How d'you do?"

"Thompson!" said Thompson, pleased. "Snap! And this is my colleague, Thomson without a 'p'."

"Pleased to meet you," Thomson said, shaking Allan's hand. "Is that an American accent?"

"It is," Allan agreed as he led them down to his cabin. "Iowa, born and bred."

"Just like John Wayne! You even sound a little like him."

Allan beamed at the comparison: people could say what they liked about The Duke, but he was still Allan's hero. "Watch the step," he said, as he showed them in. "We can talk in private here."

Looking down, Thompson watched the step but missed the low door, and bashed his head.

"And watch the door: it's a bit low…"

Thomson looked up in time to bash his head, too.

"Have a drink, gentlemen?" Allan asked innocently as he joined them. "Y'know, I have _such_ respect for the police force…"

**x**

Up on deck, Tintin wandered around taking pictures. Cameras were a great way to distract people. Show them your press credentials and they usually became suspicious or hostile – especially if they had something to hide – but show them a camera and they became all smiles. There was something about a photographer that was less threatening than a reporter, even though a picture could capture hidden things, and describe a scene better than words could.

He took a few shots – interesting perception points of the ship and the sea, and a few of the bustling activity around the loading bay and the hold – and nobody challenged him. Most of the sailors were over by the cargo hold, working to load the ship up before it set sail again. As Tintin moved further and further away from the hold, the less people he encountered, until he seemed to be quite alone. His snooping was getting him nowhere though: he couldn't see anything out of place or out of the ordinary. His instincts told him that there was _something_ here, but he didn't have enough knowledge or facts before him to make an accurate guess as to what was really going on.

Tom watched as Tintin strolled by, camera held loosely over one shoulder now. He was completely alone – even the dog was gone. Tom hefted the wooden baseball bat and struck, smacking Tintin hard in the back of the head. He didn't think it was hard enough to kill the lad, but if it did… Oh well! They were sailing in about an hour and the sea keeps those she takes…

**x**

"Simply put, gentlemen: Herbert was a terrible drunk," Allan said regretfully. "He always had a love of the bottle, but since his granddaughter's death he'd gotten worse. To be honest, I'm not all that surprised at how it happened: the number of close-calls we had with him on board the ship - while out at sea - would make your mind boggle."

Thomson and Thompson puffed their cigars and absently toasted the First Mate. "So you met him in town," Thomson said, "on the night he died?"

"Yep. He was as drunk as a lord."

"And he was drunk as a lord. He must have met his end getting back on board here, then."

"Seems the most likely scenario," Allan agreed sadly.

"Plain as a pikestaff."

"To be precise: as pike as a plainstaff," Thompson added.

The cabin door opened and Tom stuck his head in. "Sorry to interrupt," he said cheerfully, "but that's done, Mate."

"Good," said Allan, getting up. "I'll come and have a look over it now. Gentlemen?" he added, glancing back at Thompson and Thomson. They took the hint and shook his hand again.

"Thank you for your help," Thomson said.

"I'm delighted to have been some use," Allan replied, with a polite nod. "Watch your step. And your heads. Yes, that door is _very_ low, isn't it? Nothing broken, I hope? Good. Watch now: the deck is quite slippery there… Whoops! Here, let me help you up. Now, mind that rope – Never mind. Tom, can you give him your arm? Good. Here we are. Have a safe journey home, detectives. _Watch your step!_ Jesus," he muttered to Tom, "these guys are freaking clumsy!"

"Oh, hey!" Tom called after Thompson and Thomson, as soon as they had finished falling down the gangplank. "The photographer guy said he'll meet you down at _Long John's_, the pub just opposite the harbour master's office. He left here about fifteen minutes ago."

"Fine," Thomson called back as he helped Thompson up. "I'd actually forgotten about Tintin…"

"Raise the gangplank," Allan whispered to Tom. "We cast off now. Let's get the hell out of here."

**x**

Snowy was having a great time. He was surrounded by new, great smells and people willing to pet him. He'd sat up, begged, rolled over and played dead a few times and got rewarded with half a sandwich. He'd peed on countless things, clearly marking the big-iron-fish-smelly-thing as his own, but now he was lonely. The tall human-men were busy now, and he'd been shoo-ed twice already. It was time to find his Primary Care Giver and see if there was any Pedigree Chum to be had: Belly-Clock said it was dinner time, and Belly-Clock never lied.

Nose to the ground, he followed his old, faithful friend – Smell – until he found Tintin.

**x**

Dazed and in pain, and barely aware of what was going on, Tintin had allowed himself to be tied tightly to a set of horizontal pipes. Now that he was fully awake he was determined to get free. He tested the rope at his wrists, which bound his hands behind his back and secured them to one of the pipes, which ran the whole length of the room and disappeared into the wall at the other end, but there was no give in them. His ankles were also tied together and lashed to a second pipe, and his head was killing him.

"Scumbag," he muttered as he tried to struggle free. "Knocking out folk and tying them up… Anyone would think this was a sex-cruise for sadists!"

He stilled when he heard footsteps outside the door. Something clanged and creaked and the door swung open to reveal a man in a trench coat, who Tintin thought he recognised as the First Mate, Mr Whats-his-name.. He was also accompanied by the man that had attacked Tintin.

"Well, well!" Allan said with a grin. "The famous reporter, Tintin!"

"I hear stories about the things sailors get up to at sea," Tintin said, "and you're not doing anything to dispel those myths. Care to untie me?"

"Oh, I don't know," Allan said thoughtfully. "A little bit of rope can go a long way, and there's a certain charm to your helplessness."

"Are you going to keep me here long?" Tintin demanded. "This has gone beyond a joke."

Allan tutted and shook his head. "Dear me!" he said. "I don't know how long I'll keep you here. It depends."

"On what? You could at least tell me _why_ you're doing this to me!"

"Ha! You know why, don't you. Don't come the innocent with me, my lad. Although I admit, it does suit you…" He winked at Tintin and nudged Tom, and they both laughed heartily. Tintin bit his tongue and let them leave: he'd get no useful answers from either of them.

**x**

Smell led Snowy to the back of the ship. Then, strangely, the familiar Tintin-scent disappeared and was replaced by a strange-man-scent. Bemused, Snowy snuffled around as he tried to make sense of the information at hand. Or rather: the information at nose.

Tintin was here, definitely _here_, but Smell said that Tintin hadn't gone anywhere else. Smell said that Tintin should still be _here_, but Eyes showed that Tintin _wasn't_ here. It was very confusing, so he ignored that problem and concentrated on another: where Tintin-scent left off, strange-man-scent started, so Snowy followed that scent. As he snuffled along, Smell kicked in to over-drive and told the little dog he was on the right trail: every so often, he could pick up fainter traces of Tintin-scent.

Tintin had come this way. But he hadn't walked.

Tintin-scent grew stronger and stronger until Smell led Snowy into a room-thing, where the Tintin-scent and the strange-man-scent were _very _strong. Snowy looked up. There was Tintin! Hurray! Tail was happy now, and wagged to show its appreciation, but the two tall human-men that were with Tintin smelled _wrong:_ like rotting meat and ashes.

Eyes saw that Tintin was sitting down, and looked angry, like the time Snowy had peed on the paper-thing, and Smell could smell fear coming from him…

Oh dear. Best to hide, then, and wait for the two tall human-men to leave. He ducked behind a crate and waited until Ears told him they were gone, and went straight to Tintin.

"Snowy blah-blah-blah!" Tintin exclaimed. Snowy pricked up his ears and jumped at his master happily, trying to lick his face. "Blah-blah-blah-blah Good Boy!"

Hmm. Something was wrong: Snowy could sense it at once: he wasn't being petted or scratched. Usually, when Tintin was happy to see him he petted Snowy, but now it wasn't happening and, by the tail of Doggy God, Snowy would know the reason why. He made his way around Tintin, snuffling and examining him carefully.

_There! Right there! Look! Look at the things! There's things there!_

Snowy eyed the things on Tintin's wrists. They looked like the dreaded Lead: thin and long and horrible. He'd have to chew his way through that…

**x**

Snowy set to work on the ropes, growling playfully as he tugged and chewed at his master's bonds. Tintin swallowed his fear, guessing it was too late for escape: he could hear a distant, repetitive chugging noise that was growing louder with every second, and as it grew vibrations accompanied it. It was, he thought, the engine. A loud bullhorn blasted loudly as the chugging grew to fever pitch, and as he finally pulled his hands free he listed slightly as the ship finally sailed out of Nieuwpoort harbour.

He had two choices: he could run, panicking, to the deck and hope that they weren't too far from the shore for him to swim to, or he could stay calm and avoid detection, and find another way off the ship later.

He quickly untied his ankles and tried the door, but it wouldn't open from the inside. "There goes that idea," he said to Snowy. Snowy cocked his head and pretended to listen, all the while wondering where his dinner was. "I suppose there's no point sitting here, waiting to rot. I'm just going to have to find another way out of here."

**x**

Up in the comms-room, Allan reclined in his chair, a cigar clamped between his lips like The Duke. Tom sat at the radio, waiting for a message from their boss. When it came, it came in a series of clicks and whirrs that could only be deciphered by a chosen few.

"Got it," Tom said, pulling the headphones off.

"What does it say?" Allan asked.

"_Send T. to the bottom,"_ Tom read out. "What a shame! I just sent Pedro down there with some food for him too."

"Good. It's fitting that he gets a final meal," Allan said morbidly.

"It's a shame to waste him. We know places that'll pay good money for a kid that looks like him," Tom said, his voice neutral. What they were talking about was hush-hush, even for them: the continuing slave trade that had adapted with the changing times.

Allan looked as though he was considering the idea, but eventually shook his head. "Ain't worth it," he said at last. "And it ain't worth pissing the boss off to have a little fun first, either. Just kill him and be done with it."

"Whatever you say, Mate," Tom said with a little sigh. He'd seen an e-mail from his wife a while ago: those faux-marble counters cost a bloody fortune. "I'll go get a length of rope and some lead: that'll sort him out."

"Let me know when it's done." Allan yawned widely, and the conversation was over.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Notes:<strong>

1) Allan was originally Allan Thompson. However, his surname name was dropped in the English-language versions to avoid confusing readers with the English Thompson and Thomson, who were called Dupond and Dupont in the French versions.

2) Allan has the Iowa/Midwestern accent in the Elipse/Nelvana _Tintin_ series. However, my father was a huge fan of John Wayne and when I first started reading Tintin, the year before the Elipse/Nelvana television show (Oh god! I'm old!) first aired, I always imagined him to have a John Wayne accent. I'm not sure why, but it just seemed to fit. Therefore, to me, Allan will always be a Midwestern American.

3) Writing from Snowy's perspective is _fun_. I'd love to know what dogs are thinking about when they do stuff.

4) Note about Allan and Tom's conversation about the slave trade: it still exists and it's just as horrible as it ever was. I urge everyone to get informed and campaign to end the on-going slave trade.


	5. Chapter 5

**Five**

* * *

><p>Whistling softly to himself, Tom trotted down the stairs to the belly of the <em>Karaboudjan.<em> In one hand he held a length of coiled rope. In the other he held a large piece of heavy lead, already tied to the end of the rope. He'd seen people drown before and knew it wasn't a pleasant death. The poor sod: Tintin would have no chance with his hands tied behind his back. What he would have, though, was _time. _Time to reflect, as his body started to trash in desperate need of air, on his busy-body ways and the value of keeping one's nose out of other people's business.

He reached the room where Tintin was being held captive. He dropped the rope and weight heavily, so that it clanged loudly as it landed. He opened the door and invited himself in cheerfully. It took a few extra seconds for his brain to catch up with his eyes, and to figure out what he was seeing. His voice trailed away.

Pedro was tied up in place of Tintin, a gag tied over his mouth. Confused, Tom looked around the small room. He even checked behind the door before he checked behind the few small crates that were stored here. At last he went to Pedro and yanked the gag from his mouth. "What the _hell!"_ he cried.

"It wasn't my fault!" Pedro exclaimed. "That little bastard! He said he couldn't eat with his hands tied behind his back, and when I went to untie them he bloody hit me! I think the little runt bit me on the ankle too! It's friggin' _killing_ me!"

"Jesus, Pedro, that's nothing compared to what the Mate'll do to you!"

x

At first, Tom had been surprised. Allan had listened to Pedro patiently, nodding along thoughtfully and even asking a few questions as Pedro explained what had happened. "Well," the First Mate said at last, "it's clear what happened here."

"What's that, Mate?" Tom asked cautiously.

Allan punched Pedro square on the nose. "This man's a God-damned half wit! Probably a wimp too. How hard can a kid hit? Goddamn it, Pedro" – he kicked Pedro's leg viciously as the other man lay on the ground, whimpering – "you freaking wussy!" He turned to Tom. "We have to find him. _Now."_

"Hey Pedro, where's your gun?" Tom asked suddenly. "You had one, didn't you?"

Pedro looked even more shame-faced.

"Un-frickin'-believable!" Allan snapped.

x

With a groan, Tintin heaved the last crate on to the top of the pile. He was now, hopefully, barricaded in. He hadn't even bothered trying to get to the deck: the ship was teaming with crewmen now and there was no telling how far away from the shore they were. He was a strong swimmer but Snowy was so small he couldn't really risk it. Instead, he'd checked out a few of the cargo rooms. There'd been no way to tell what was being shipped, but when he'd found a room where most of the boxes were marked 'perishable' and 'fragile', he figured there was a good chance that the perishables might be food.

He'd decided to stay put, barricading the door to keep them out. There were no locks on the inside, so he'd used some of the crates instead, stacking them across the doorway so that the door would be too heavy to push open. He still had no idea what was inside the crates, but he'd heard the unmistakable sound of glass clashing together when he was moving some of the crates. He hoped they contained bottles of water.

He stood back and looked proudly at the barricade. "That's a good pile!" he said happily. "Now, let's see what's on the menu. I'm starving."

There was an old, rusted crowbar propped up against the corner. He grabbed it and started levering the lid off one of the crates, picked at random from those that remained.

_Please be water, please be water, please be water,_ he thought to himself.

_Chicken chicken chicken chicken walk play chicken play chicken walk_, Snowy thought as he watched Tintin. He wasn't particularly curious about the contents of the crate, but chicken, walking, and playing were never far from his thoughts anyway.

The top of the crate popped off and Tintin peered in curiously. More tins of crab, each baring the same red and yellow label as the one he had found discarded on the street in Nieuwpoort. "Well, that's our food sorted," Tintin murmured. He set to work on a second crate, one of the ones that had sounded like it contained glass, and soon had that lid off too. "Champagne!" he cried. "Snowy, m'boy, we dine in style!"

_Chicken? _Snowy thought to himself when he saw how pleased Tintin looked. He boosted himself up and looked in to the crate. _No chicken. Boo! Bubbly-fizzy-thing? Yay!_

"I think I deserve a drink." Tintin sat on top of another crate and busied himself with opening a bottle of champagne. He paused, cocking his head, at a noise on the other side of the door. He shushed Snowy and waited, listening as the remote noise turned into the sound of footsteps.

He knew that they would have noticed his disappearance by now. They were probably searching for him, but with luck they would simply think that had headed for the deck, little suspecting that he'd simply moved a few rooms down…

The footsteps were right outside his door. He held his breath… And the cork exploded from the champagne bottle.

He jumped at the sudden _Bang!_, holding the bottle away as the contents fizzed up and over. The cork flew out and hit Snowy on the head, eliciting a frightened yelp.

Swearing silently to himself, Tintin quickly rushed to his pile of crates, ready to back them up if the men tried force their way in, but it was unnecessary: the First Mate called them off.

"Ass!" Allan snapped loudly and angrily as Pedro struggled with the door in an attempt to make up for his previous incompetence. "It's obvious: he's barricaded himself in. Screw it: we'll starve him out. He's got nothing to eat in there."

"Pfft, that's where _you're_ wrong, pal!" Tintin muttered. He backed away and, using his Swiss Army knife, he managed to lever the lid off one of the crabs of tin. "Oh," he said flatly as he looked inside. "Well, that's heroin. Damn. So they're drug smugglers. And he's right: I have no food."

He gazed around as his brain went to work furiously. Snowy, on the other hand, had drunk all of the spilt champagne and was attempting to walk in a straight line.

_I have wood. I have Styrofoam chips. I have a bit of rope,_ Tintin thought. _Now, how the heck can I MacGyver my way out of this one?_

x

Allan left Pedro and Tom down bellow, keeping an eye on Tintin's hiding place. Allan himself, on the other hand, still had a ship to run and it wasn't likely that the reporter could manage to slip passed two grown men. At least, he _hoped_ so, but he just had too much to do than to baby-sit a locked room.

He was at the wheel, checking over the day's shipping routes, when Jumbo interrupted him.

"Captain wants to see you, Mate," Jumbo said.

"That old soak?" Allan rolled his eyes, frustrated at being interrupted. "What the hell does he want?"

"No idea, but he's making a bit of a row. You know what he's like."

"Of course I do," Allan muttered as he pushed by the other man. _I did my damnedest to make him this way!_

x

Captain Archibald Haddock was floating on a sea of despair. Sailing in a ship of sorrows. Blown forth by the winds of cruelty. Tethered to the shores of regret… Sailing on waves of corruption! Fed on by the fish of –

"Captain!" Allan tried again, snapping his fingers in front of the man's bulbous, red nose. "Captain? You wanted to see me?"

Haddock looked up, disturbed from his poetic reverie, and saw two Allans standing before him. He closed one eye and looked at the Allan that remained. "You! You're… Ah! You're here!" he said. His head swayed from side to side slightly. "I… It… It's intolerable, Mate!"

"Is it?" Allan sat down and waited for Haddock to continue. It was actually quite comical, watching this wreck of a man attempt to communicate.

"I… Yes! Yes, _e-e-exactly_ right! It… It's wicked, Mate! I'm… It's wicked!"

"Really?"

"Yes! I'm… I'm left to… to _die_ here! Of thirst!" He upturned the whisky bottle and almost dropped it. "It's dislipi…. Desplici…. Delici… It's wicked!"

"Well, that's not on, is it?" Allan said kindly. "I'll have a new bottle sent up at once, Captain."

"Ooh! My friend! My only friend! You're my besht mate, Mate."

_Oh Christ, he's getting sentimental again…_ "Of course," Allan said soothingly. "You know I wouldn't keep you from your whisky." He got out of there quickly: the Captain was a maudlin drunk.

Outside, he called Jumbo back. "What have I told you?" he hissed. "Keep him drunk!"

"But he'll kill himself, Mate!" Jumbo protested. "Have you seen the amount of whisky that man goes through?"

"So? Do you want him to sober up and figure out what's going on? As long as he's drunk, I'm boss and we get to keep doing what we're doing."

"But what if he does die?" Jumbo pointed out, not unreasonably.

"So we dump his ass overboard and pretend he's still alive! He has no family – his brother hasn't spoken to him since they were kids, for Christ's sake! Who the hell will come looking for him?" Allan closed his coat over his throat and scowled at the smaller Asian man. "Bring him some whisky right now. And keep it flowing: as long as he's like that, we run the ship and the money keeps rolling in. Got it? Good." He turned on his heel and stalked away, back to the bridge of the _Karaboudjan. _

In the belly of the ship, Tintin went to work.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's note:<strong> The word the Captain is reaching for is 'despicable'.


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note:** The following chapter is rated for sea-worthy language, mateys.

* * *

><p><strong>Six<strong>

* * *

><p>Outside the barricaded cargo hold, Pedro kept careful watch on the door. Inside, Tintin watched the sky outside the porthole and waited for night. When the sun finally slipped below the horizon and the last red streaks had bled from the sky, it was time to put his plan into action.<p>

The circular shaped porthole opened outwards, and the hold was high enough up from the waterline to stop any waves from pouring in. Earlier, Tintin had examined his options carefully and realised that if he leaned out far enough he could see the row of portholes on the deck above his. One in particular, the porthole directly above his own, had been open all day. All he had to do was get up there somehow and he could escape, or at least get to the comms-room and send a message out, asking for help.

But how to get up there?

It had taken a while, but he'd finally managed to figure that part out too: two wooden planks, stripped from the crates and tied to the end of the rope, could be fashioned into a sort of crude grappling hook. If he threw it a certain way he was sure the wood would hold the rope in place.

Whether or not it would hold his weight, or whether the planks would snap with the extra stress, was another story entirely…

"Well, here goes nothing!" He leaned out and eyed the open porthole above. He took careful aim – _Steady… Steady _– and tossed the planks up. They reached the porthole no problem, but he'd aimed too far to the left. The wood hit the side of the ship with a loud, metallic _Clang!_ and rebounded, smacking Tintin on the head as gravity did its job and brought the crude construct back down with a bump. Gritting his teeth, he reeled the wood back in and tried again, taking a more careful aim.

He held his breath as the wood soared up, up, _up…_ And in! Elated, he almost whooped with delight and relief, but managed to restrain himself. He tested it by tugging on the rope until it was taking his full weight. Content that it was as safe as it would ever be, he picked up Snowy and arranged the dog safely over his shoulder before beginning his climb up.

It was awkward – made more awkward by Snowy fidgeting around, highly entertained by his lofty new position and determined to make the white-topped waves that leaped from the sea pay for their insolence – but somehow Tintin managed it. Hand over hand, he climbed ever higher, bracing his feet against he side of the ship like Adam West and Burt Ward climbing a skyscraper (a thought that made him grin a little) until – _at last! – _he had reached the open porthole.

He briefly recognised that there was a man sitting at a desk near the porthole, but he'd already thrown himself inside the open window beore he could stop himself. He rolled forward, landing on the messy bunk below and accidentally kicking the stranger between the shoulder blades. Before the man had a chance to react, Tintin had his gun out, aimed squarely at the stranger's face.

The stranger looked old and worn. A thick head of black, unruly hair matched his magnificent beard – not quite large enough to lose a badger in, but certainly a large vole of some sort. His eyes were dark and bloodshot with heavy bags underneath, and his nose was bulbous and shot through with the red, cracked capillaries of a hardened drunk. Amusingly – or ironically – he wore a thick blue jumper with the motif of an anchor on the chest. In all, he looked a bit like Captain Birdseye's disappointing, middle-aged son.

"What the hell!" the man said, astonished. He took a cursory glance at the bottle of whisky he held. "I thought only absinth had fairies!"

"I'm not a fairy," Tintin hissed. "Don't make another sound. I'll shoot you if I have to." He shook the gun half-heartedly for emphasis.

"Oh yeah? Well, I got a gun too! And who the _hell_ do you think you are, coming in here and threatening me?"

"Those are your fingers, not a gun. And I'm the reporter you people kidnapped!"

"Kidnapped?" the man said with a disbelieving snort.

"Yes! _Kidnapped!_ You guys almost bashed my head in! But the jokes on you: I saw your cargo."

"Call the police! We're delivering _John West_ tuna!" The man put his hands up. "It's a fair cop, guv!"

"_John West _my butt! What about all the heroin?"

"Heroin?" The man stilled and glared at Tintin. "Son, accusations like that can ruin a man's reputation, so you shut your damned mouth."

Tintin pulled a handful of wraps out of his pocket and tossed them at the man. "So what's that?" he asked coldly.

The man studied the cellophane wraps of heroin. When he looked back up, his face was like thunder. "Do you know who I am?" he demanded. "I'm Captain Haddock, master of this ship! And I don't take kindly to blistering whippersnappers that bring drugs onto _my_ boat!"

"I didn't bring them here," Tintin snapped. "I found them in _your_ precious ship! There's crates and crates of the stuff down in _your_ hold, where _I_ was being held captive. Do you honestly think I wanted to spend a whole day tied to a pipe on board this vile, stinking tub?"

"You watch your damned mouth!" the Captain cried. "I have the shipping manifestos to prove" –

"And I have the drugs!" Tintin pointed out. "They're in your hold, Captain."

"Bollox! There's _John West _down there or" –

"They're not even in _John West_ tins!" Tintin cried, exasperated. "They're in some red and yellow tin I don't even recognise! And it's crab meat, not tuna."

The Captain stood up abruptly and staggered to a wall-mounted box-shelf that contained a series of thick, ring-binder style folders, the spine of each labelled neatly. He selected one and flipped through the pages until he found the entry he needed. He examined it closely, closing one eye to rid himself of his double vision. "Twenty thousands tins of crab," he said slowly. "Well, that's not right: it should be miscellaneous cans…"

"It's not crab meat," Tintin said earnestly. "It's drugs, Captain."

The Captain's face was ashen as he looked at Tintin. "Jesus Christ," he said weakly. "There's drugs in my hold!" He tossed the folder onto the bunk and staggered back to his chair. "Oh God! I'm a smuggler! I'm a fucking _drug-smuggler!_ Oh Jesus! I'm going to jail! Crap, crap, _craaaaaaaaap_!"

"Sssshhhh!" Convinced of the Captain's innocence, Tintin put the gun down and tried to comfort him. "Help me get off this ship and I'll help you when the police are involved."

"Allan! You treacherous _bastard!"_ the Captain roared.

"Shhh!"

"I'll kill him! The mutinous, two-faced shite!"

"_Shhhh!_ And for goodness sake, stop swearing!"

The Captain buried his face in his hands. "Oh God! There goes my business! There goes my reputation! Bye-bye, dreams of a legitimate shipping corporation! So long, everything I've spent my entire life working towards! I'm ruined! Oh God: they're going to take my ship!" he reached out and grabbed Tintin's arms. "Don't let them take my ship! She's all I have left!"

"Be quiet!" Tintin pleaded. The Captain was wailing by now. "Stop! Pull yourself together, man! Look at yourself. The only reason they were able to get away with this is because you're a drunk. You must quit drinking, Captain. What would your poor mother say if she saw you like this?"

The Captain thought of his poor mother and promptly burst into tears. "Ahwaaaaaaah! Boo-hoo-hoo! Mummy!"

"This is why I don't drink," Tintin said savagely. "Stop crying!"

"I want my mum!"

Tintin's heart leaped as, in the corridor outside, someone shouted to somebody else. They called out an answer and footsteps came towards the Captain's cabin and the bawling man. Cursing emotional drunks, Tintin dove towards the porthole and prayed he still had time.

**x**

Allan threw the door open and surveyed the scene. Haddock was crying his eyes out, face down on the desk. With any luck, he'd have finally lost his mind. "What the hell is going on?" the First Mate snapped.

"Oh God!" Haddock wept. "I'm a miserable wretch!"

"You only figured that out now?" Allan refilled the Captain's glass and held it out to him. "Here, drink this: it'll cheer you up."

"I can't!"

"Yes you can."

"Gosh, I never thought about it like that. Thanks!"

The Captain reached out for the glass, but at the last second he knocked it away, splashing Allan. "I can't," he repeated regretfully. "I promised him I wouldn't drink any more."

Allan felt a chill run down his spine. "Who?" he asked urgently. "Who did you promise that to?"

"The Whisky-Fairy!" The Captain gestured at the porthole behind him, and for the first time since entering Allan saw Tintin's crude grappling hook.

"Cock-_sucker_!" Allan shouted.

"Sock-cooker!" the Captain corrected him. "He also said I should stop swearing. Y'know, for a drunken fairy he wasn't all that keen on vices…"

"Tom!" Allan shouted. "Jumbo!" The two sailors came running, eager to please the Mate when he was in a high dudgeon. "That little bastard managed to get up here!"

"Huh," said Jumbo, examining the grappling hook. "That's actually quite ingenious."

"I'll kill you," Allan warned, his voice perfectly level. He sounded calm, as though he'd just told them they were out of milk. "I swear, Jumbo, I'm about ready to kill someone and you're looking like a good candidate."

"Sorry," Jumbo said quickly, letting the planks of wood fall.

"For that, you get to stay here. Catch him if he comes back. Tom, do we still have that box of explosives? Good. Go and get them and meet me downstairs: I'm gonna blow the door off that stinkin' hold!"

**x**

Feeling a lot like John Wayne, Allan swaggered back down to the cargo hold. He hooked his thumbs into his belt and waited with Pedro until Tom arrived, a wooden box held in his arms. He patted the box as he handed it over to the Mate.

Allan knelt and set it up. Using a circular saw, he cut a square hole in the bottom of the door and slid the box of explosives in, pushing a crate laboriously out of the way. For a second the whole barricade teetered precariously, and Allan hoped that it would fall, rendering the use of the explosives unnecessary, but the top boxes simply shifted a little and settled snugly on top of the new box.

He lit the fuse and they backed away, dodging down the corridor and into another nearby hold. The fuse hissed and spluttered before a huge explosion rocked the deck. It was a drastic measure, to be sure, but The Duke never would have stood for this sort of thing.

When the ringing in his ears had finally died away, Allan pulled out his gun and sidled back along the corridor, almost hugging the wall. The door was now a sheet of twisted metal, torn clear off its hinges by the blast. Shattered wood and long, lethal looking splinters littered the ground. There was no noise from the hold, though.

"Must've knocked him out," Allan muttered as they neared the door. They stood to one side, waiting to see if Tintin would emerge.

"Or else he's pretending," Tom whispered back. "That kid's smart, Mate. I wouldn't put it past him."

"In that case, just shoot him as soon as you see him."

They nodded at each other and prepared to step around the corner into the room.

A gunshot rang out and a bullet whizzed past them. "The little shit!" Tom swore. "He's trying to kill us! How dare he!"

Pedro looked affronted. "What did we ever do to - Oh, wait, never mind."

"I'll settle his hash," Allan vowed. He leaned around the corner like a gunslinger and let off a shot at where he thought Tintin was hiding. He pulled back in time to dodge three answering shots and –

"A champagne cork?" Tom asked, puzzled. He picked it up and showed it to Allan. Now that the smoke from the explosion was starting to clear they could see at least two other corks rolling around on the ground.

"Oh, God damn it! The champagne!" Now Allan was _really_ pissed: that was a legitimate contract and it was worth a lot of money. He stormed into the darkened hold, fully intending to wreak a terrible vengeance upon Tintin, but instead he took a champagne cork to the face. He swore loudly, and they were driven back as more bottles exploded, shooting their corks through the air at high speed.

It had been a short foray, and not worthy of The Duke, but it had been enough to show Allan that Tintin wasn't in there.

_So where the hell is he...?_ Allan wondered. _Unless… Unless he didn't leave the Captain's quarters…_

He overtook Tom in his haste, charging back up the metal stairs to the deck above. Through the twisting, maze-like corridors he ran, until he reached the Captain's cabin. He threw the door open and stopped dead in his tracks.

Jumbo was tied to a chair.

"Give us a hand, Mate," the Asian man said. "I swear it: I watched the porthole carefully, like you said, only he was hiding in the wardrobe! And he had a gun!"

His anger rising, Allan kicked out at Jumbo, planting his foot on the man's chest and kicking the chair over backwards. He turned at the sound of scuffle behind him, wary of any more tricks, and saw Jimmy the Greek (who was actually Italian) almost bowl Tom over in an effort to reach the Mate.

"There you are!" he said, breathing heavily, as though he had run a long distance. "I been searching for you everywhere, Mate! All over I run, looking for you. I find radio operator. He been knocked out!"

_So they got a message out._

Without another thought, Allan punched Jimmy on the nose. As the Italian went down, Frankie-Boy swanned in, a slight grin on his face.

"It's a rum thing, Mr Mate," he said innocently, "but the long-boat just vanished!"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> This story has been read 1,438 times, but it only has 28 reviews. If it's shit, seriously: let me know. I don't want to waste my time writing something that people don't like, and I don't want to waste your time by posting rubbish that you don't like! Anonymous reviews are turned on, and in the meanwhile, I'm going to switch to writing some Christian/Syed (EastEnders) slash-fic. If it turns out that people aren't enjoying this story, that's perfectly fine and a new Tintin fic will be up in a while. But unless I get some feedback, I genuinely don't know what the readers want!


	7. Chapter 7

**Seven**

* * *

><p>The waves were higher than the boat. This was the first thing Tintin noticed as they rowed the longboat away from the <em>Karaboudjan<em>. They towered over, and tossed, the small rowboat mercilessly as Tintin and the Captain sat side by side and worked the oars. It took some time, but they got into a good rhythm and by the time dawn had broken their muscles were burning and the _Karaboudjan_ had disappeared over the horizon. It was as good a time as any to take a break and try to figure out what to do next.

The Captain had sobered up considerably and was proving to be an able seaman. "Right," he said firmly, "we're out of immediate danger, but the _Karaboudjan_ can catch us up if they turn."

"_If?"_ Tintin asked anxiously. "Will they come after us?"

The Captain screwed up his face and thought about it for a moment. "I don't think so," he said at last. "Drugs or not, cargo is cargo and everything has to be delivered on time. Trying to find one boat in the ocean would be like searching for a needle in a haystack, and the reason they've been able to get away with this for so long is because the _Karaboudjan_ is a legitimate cargo ship. It would be easier for them to make all the other deliveries and just dump the drugs if the police show up before they can pass them on."

"So we're free and clear then?"

"Not quite, lad: we're at least sixty miles from the Spanish coast and getting there will be a bit of a cu- er… a blistering hard time." He shot a quick look at Tintin. "What did you say your name was again?"

"Tintin."

"Right. And, er, how old are you?"

"Old enough to know what a 'cu-er' is."

"Fair enough. Look, we've got a bi- _hell _of a row ahead of us. You'd best get some rest now. Then I'll have a kip while you take the oars. Agreed?"

It seemed like the best plan they had and the only sensible way of preserving their energy, so Tintin readily agreed and hunkered down for a nap in the back of the longboat. Tucking himself into his coat, and with Snowy snuggled against his stomach, he was soon asleep and dreaming peacefully.

At the other end of the boat, the Captain kept rowing. It felt like an age had passed since he had last done something like this. Years ago, before he'd owned his own ship, he'd worked with a man named Chester and they'd thought nothing of rowing to land when their ship was anchored near a city, even if the ship wasn't in port. They used to do it every chance they got.

He missed the old days. Everything was simpler back then.

God, he was thirsty though. And cold. Even the lad looked cold.

_Tintin. That's a strange name. And is it just me or does he look a bit young to be out here on his own? His poor parents: Tintin had radioed the police before they'd abandoned the _Karaboudjan_, but he hadn't thought to tell the police to contact his parents, or given them any information on how to contact them. They must be bloody worried. _

He stopped rowing for half a minute to roll his shoulders. They were aching, but it was a _good_ ache. Other than a few days here and there – mainly around Christmas – he'd spent the last two years sitting in his cabin, drinking.

_Christ, that's a pitiful thought! Remind me never to tell anyone that, brain! How the hell did it get this bad, Archie? Used to be that nobody could get the drop on me. I was always half a step ahead of everyone. So how the hell did that cu – er… _- he glanced quickly at the sleeping Tintin - …_I suppose it's not really good manners to swear like a sailor around such a young kid. I'll have to keep an eye on that. _

_Where was I? Oh, yeah. How the heck did that… treacherous scourge, Allan, outsmart me? Yes, the man was intelligent: that's why I hired him on as my First Mate. But where did the slyness come from? When did the wanton cunning begin? _

_How long have they been using my boat to run drugs?_

He stopped rowing again and tried to knead the back of his neck, to work the kinks out. He rolled his head from side to side a couple of times and saw, out of the corner of his eye –

"Eey! Provisions!" _That's right: we stashed some food and stuff in here, in case of an emergency! Thank fu- er, fudge for that!_

He bent down and retrieved the supplies from their snug box in the cubby: there were biscuits, a keg of fresh water, a flare gun, a first aid kit, and a bottle of rum.

"Oh, sweet, divine Mary I knew you hadn't given up on me!" He held the bottle aloft, as though a beam of heavenly light had exalted it, and examined it.

_Not my favourite, but I won't complain! Ooh, wait a minute…_ His brow furrowed as he thought back to a previous conversation with Tintin. _I swore never to drink again, and a Haddock keeps his word. _

He made to throw the bottle into the ocean, but finally came to his senses.

"Good grief!" He shook his head. "A little drop to warm myself up won't kill me! That's why it's here."

_So why does it sound like I'm trying to convince myself that it's ok to drink it?_

"Quiet, you!" He necked half the bottle in one go, coming up for air and to burp. He was starting to feel a lot better now, so he took another small sip and was soon surprised to find the bottle empty.

_Huh. Musht be a… a hole innit or something…_

He threw the bottle into the ocean and grasped the oars again. From where he was sitting, he could clearly see Tintin. The teenager was curled around the small dog.

"Poor lil' bastard!" the Captain said sorrowfully. "He mushst be cold too. Ahh! Pffft!" He grinned and shook his head. "I'm an idiot! I know what to do…"

**x**

Tintin was dreaming. It started off as one of his usual, normal dreams – flying the T.A.R.D.I.S through a black hole before giving one to Amy Pond over the console – but then morphed into a nightmare as a drunken Dalek ran amok and the T.A.R.D.I.S burned around him. He was cut off from the door, and couldn't find the swimming pool…

He awoke with a start, coughing and spluttering as acrid black smoke choked him. He was roasting! He opened his eyes and sat up. For a few seconds all he could do was watch while his brain woke up and caught up.

There was a fire in the middle of the boat.

Through the towering flames and black smoke, Tintin could see the Captain. He was just sitting there, eating what appeared to be a packet of Hob Nobs and warming his hands.

"Morning!" the Captain said cheerily.

"Are those our oars?" Tintin asked, astonished. "Are you.. Are you _burning our oars? _Great snakes, have you gone _mental?"_ He couldn't believe what he was seeing: the Captain had actually set fire to the oars! "The hell with this!" Tintin rummaged in the locker beside him and came up with a bucket that was probably used to bail out water in case of a leak.

The Captain, seeing this, stood up and shook his fist at Tintin. "You ungrateful little vegetated troglodyte! If… if y-you p-put that out, y-you'll have to settle with me, boyo!"

Tintin ignored him and haled in a bucket of seawater. If they were lucky, he'd be able to put the fire out and salvage some of the oars. Enough to get them back to dry land, at least. Snowy started to bark as, behind Tintin, the Captain leaped through the smoke and tried to seize the bucket before Tintin could dump the water over the flames.

"Let go of that bucket, you meddlesome cabin-boy!" the Captain shouted. They struggled together, each trying to wrestle the bucket from the other, until Tintin's foot slipped and they went down. The boat rocked alarmingly, and as it tipped it went over, dousing the flames and knocking them both into the water.

Gasping at the coldness of the water, Tintin resurfaced and clung to the boat. It had capsized and was floating upside down, like a vast scarab beetle. The Captain surfaced a short distance away with the bucket on his head. As he swam over, Tintin boosted himself and Snowy onto the back of the boat and straddled it uncomfortably.

"I'm so, so sorry," the Captain said as he clambered on. "I don't know what came over me."

"I do," Tintin snapped. "You were drunk, weren't you? How did you manage that out here? Did we pass a floating pub or something?"

"No, there was a bottle of rum in the locker. I'm such a miserable bast-er… wretch." Hang-dog and soaking wet, the Captain looked truly miserable.

"I don't suppose there's any food?" Tintin asked hopefully. "I'm starving. I haven't eaten since breakfast yesterday."

The Captain looked at the water around them. "There_ was,"_ he said apologetically.

Tintin sighed and rolled his eyes tiredly.

"Look," said the Captain hastily, "if we get out of this alive – I mean, _when_ we get back to shore, I'll" –

"Shh!" Tintin snapped. He frowned and cocked his head.

"There's no need to be pissy! I was just going to say" –

"_Hush!"_ Tintin held up his hand. "Listen… Do you hear that?"

It was a faint, low rumble that was growing louder. Then, out of a bank of misty cloud to the west –

"A seaplane!" Tintin cried. "We're saved!"

"Glory be! Hey! _Hey up there!"_ The Captain waved his arms wildly, making the boat wobble alarmingly. "Has it seen us yet? _Oh, shit! Get down!"_

"And get funky?" Tintin watched, bemused, as the Captain swung his leg over the boat and slipped back into the water. "What's the matter?"

"That's _my_ seaplane!" the Captain cried. "It's from the _Karaboudjan!"_

"Oh, no!"

The plane swooped low and thundered towards them. Before he had time to act, they were firing at Tintin. He clung on desperately, flattening himself to the slick underside of the boat as the water splashed around him and bullets rained down. He held his breath as the plane flew right over his head, close enough that he could almost reach up and touch the fuselage. Then it swung to starboard and prepared to make another pass.

"_Get down!" _the Captain was shouting. Snowy was barking furiously, terrified and angry at the loud noise and the close proximity of the big-scary-sky-thing that was making it.

Before the plane had time to complete its turn, Tintin slid down from his perch, his gun in his hand. He pressed himself to the side of the boat as the plane passed over again, firing in a tight line along the waves. Their shooting was getting better; more controlled. If they made a third pass they would be on target.

He made up his mind.

It was hard to fire and swim at the same time so he heaved himself back up onto the boat, lying flat on his belly, and took aim. He loosed off two quick shots. One shot missed completely, but the second had been lucky, and as the plane attempted to turn again the engine started to splutter.

"What a shot!" the Captain shouted jubilantly.

"At least I hit him," Tintin said ruefully. He slipped out of his coat and slid back into the water. They watched as the engine turned over and the plane banked sharply. But the pilot was good, and managed to coast it down to land on the choppy water a fair distance from them. All they could see was the top of the plane, bright yellow against the coarse blue of the sea, as the waves rose and fell beneath it.

"The engine's stopped," the Captain said warily. "They must be getting out."

He was right: first one man, and then a second, appeared on the brown pontoons that kept the plane afloat.

Both men were on the same side of the plane. "Right," said Tintin, "this is our chance. Keep Snowy here."

"What are you going to do?" the Captain asked, alarmed.

"I'm going to swim out there. If I dive a bit, I can come out behind them and surprise them."

"That's insanity! You can't possibly" –

But Tintin was gone, swimming strongly towards the plane. The choppy waves kept him hidden for the most part, but when he got too close to the plane he simply went underwater. The Captain held his breath, panicking, as Tintin disappeared from sight.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Thanks for the reviews. It's nice to know I'm not talking to myself! This will stay as the main up-dated-weekly story. I'll keep working on the others and start putting them up as this winds down.


	8. Chapter 8

**Rated for naughty language and a drunken sea captain**

* * *

><p><strong>Eight<strong>

* * *

><p>Coughing and waving away the smoke that curled out from the engine of the seaplane, the pilot examined the damage.<p>

"Well?" his co-pilot asked. He was standing on the pontoon, gun in hand and eyes trained towards the bobbing, capsized longboat.

"It's just the ignition lead," the pilot said, a touch of anger entering his voice. "Bloody typical!"

"Easily fixed," his companion pointed out evenly.

"True. Any movement from them?"

"Nothing so far. I vote we coast back and just shoot them close-range."

"Sounds like a plan to me." Both men had been surprised to discover how difficult it really was to shoot accurately at an irregularly moving target from a moving position. If this had been a film they'd be back on board the _Karaboudjan_ toasting their success by now.

"You finished yet?" the co-pilot asked. Holding onto the wing strut for balance as a large wave rocked them, he turned back towards the pilot, who was still busy with the engine. "Almost," came the reply. "I just need to tighten the" –

"Hands up!"

Tintin pulled himself part-way onto the pontoon, gun aimed at the armed co-pilot. Both men jumped and stared at him, wondering where the hell he had come from and astonished at his sudden appearance. Tintin used their surprise to pull himself up fully, straddling the pontoon. "Drop your gun," he warned. "Don't make me say it again. I'm a good shot!"

"Better do as he said," the pilot muttered. "He _is_ a good shot." He nodded towards the engine for emphasis.

The co-pilot clicked the safety back on to the gun and tossed it into the water. Moments later the Captain and Snowy swam over and joined them.

"Get them into the plane and tie them up, Captain," Tintin ordered.

"Pfft! Fuck them! I mean, sod them. They didn't give a shi- er, a damn about shooting at us when we were sitting ducks, did they? Pair of bast- I mean, gangsters."

"Yes, but we're not gangsters. Let's just tie them up and get out of here before the _Karaboudjan_ figures out that something's gone wrong and turns back."

**x**

Once the pilots were tied up and sitting on the floor in the back of the plane, Tintin tried to question them. "Who are you running the drugs for?" he asked.

"Fuck off."

"Language, gentlemen," the Captain said piously.

Tintin shrugged. "Doesn't matter," he said as he turned to face the controls in the cockpit. "They'll talk eventually, when the police get their hands on them. They always do, to save their own skin." He started flicking switches and hitting buttons with a practised ease.

"You can fly a plane?" the Captain asked doubtfully.

"Yup. I met a pilot in England last year, and stayed friends with him. He's in Afghanistan now, and I interview him every so often. Major Wings, I call him. He calls me General Trouble." The motor started to throb and the propellers whirred, drowning out his final comment; "Mind you, I've never landed successfully in my life…"

"Pardon?" the Captain asked politely as he secured his seatbelt.

"Nothing," Tintin said innocently. "Here we go!"

Their take-off wasn't as smooth as it could have been, but the Captain couldn't deny that Tintin _could_ actually fly a plane. He took a side-long glance at the lad and reassessed him. At first, aboard the _Karaboudjan_ and in the longboat, Tintin had looked young – very young: fourteen or fifteen at the most. He still looked young now, but it was impossible for him to be _that_ young. He must be one of those people that just _looked_ that young.

"How old did you say you are?" the Captain asked again, a hint of suspicion creeping into his voice.

"Am I going I the right direction for Spain?" Tintin asked worriedly.

The Captain tapped the compass on the dashboard. "I'm pretty sure. Almost certain. Whether we get there in one piece will be another story. See that on the horizon?"

"Yes…"

"That's what we in the business call 'a big fucking storm'. Holy shit. This is going to be rough." The Captain was worried enough to forget his vow of clean speaking. He'd been terrible at it anyway, he reflected. _Fuck it: I'm going to die in about ten minutes. Might as well go out cursing the gods!_

"Hang on, Captain," Tintin warned. They were baring down on the storm quickly.

"Hang on to what?" the Captain muttered. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat as the storm loomed closer: thick black clouds and sheeting rain. Every so often, deep inside the insidious grey bank, he could see the tell-tale flashes of lightening. He could almost taste the metallic hint of atmosphere. He gripped the arms of his chair until his knuckles were white, and began to beseech the gods.

"You pack of bastards! Forty five rotten years on this earth, and I get to die like this. You'd better send me to Hell, Big Guy, 'cos if you don't I'm going to kick your ass so damned hard…"

They hit the clouds and the storm washed over them, tossing them around as though they were nothing more than a toy plane on a windy day. They jolted, the Captain's stomach rolling unpleasantly as he bounced up and down in his seat, his head almost hitting the roof. He could barely hear Tintin muttering something, and even the dog was whining and howling.

Something nearby shifted with a glassy _clink_. It was strange: the noise cut through the rest of the clamour around him like an old friend's salutation. Hardly daring to hope, he looked over at the felt-padded compartment in the door and saw the thin neck of a bottle peering out at him. As he reached out for it he held his breath. _If only it's whisky. All would be fine if I could just die drunk…_ he thought desperately.

It was whisky.

_Might as well get bladdered one final time!_

He opened to bottle quickly and drank it down as fast as he could, glugging great swigs from it as though it was the nectar of the gods. The familiar haze enveloped him, and even though they were right inside the storm now, with no escape other than death or one final miracle, he found that he didn't care. Why should he? It was bloody hopeless anyway. He might as well have a bit of fun before he shuffled off this mortal coil in a blaze of screaming, fiery agony.

"Giz the controls," he said, struggling out of his seatbelt and lurching over to Tintin. He'd just thought of something funny to do. Cheer the lad up before they both died. "C'mon, giz them!"

"What?" Tintin snapped. He had answered, but his eyes were trained on the dark clouds ahead of them, trying to guide the plane through the thick grey wall and the frequent lightening.

"No, s'rsly, this'll be funny. Gimmie the controls for a sec'," the Captain said.

"I don't think this is quite the moment," Tintin replied shortly. "Sit down and leave me alone. I can't concentrate with you" – The Captain lunged for the lever and tried to yank it out of Tintin's grasp.

"What the hell are you doing?" Tintin cried. "Leave it alone! Oh God!"

The Captain pulled the lever to the side and the plane followed suit, lurching and rolling over wildly onto its back. The Captain, who was unsteady to begin with, fell backwards, rolling arse-over-tit to crash into the pilots in the back of the plane. Tintin, who was still wearing a seatbelt, managed to grab the controls back and right the plane with difficulty.

The empty bottle of whisky rolled to a stop, clinking gently against the Captain's foot. _My only friend._ He seized the bottle by the neck and staggered back towards Tintin, infuriated by the lad's unwillingness to share.

"Now then, you little dick," he said, "I don't care for your tricks." He hefted the bottle: it felt good in his hand, like it belonged there. "W-will you l-let me… let me take over: yes or, or no? I'll give y-you 'till three…"

"_Go away!"_

"One, two, three…"

"Seriously, _sod off!"_

"Then take that!" The Captain raised the bottle and brought it down on Tintin's head, hard enough to shatter the glass. He stared at the piece he still held – the broken neck – and swore. "Piece of shit bottle! You'd be no good in a bar fight!"

Tintin slumped forward, leaning heavily on the lever, and the Captain lurched forward again as the plane banked sharply and took a nose-dive. With his face inches from the glass, the Captain saw the thick grey cloud and driving rain sprint past rapidly. Beside him, Tintin groaned.

"What the hell?" the boy said weakly. He touched the back of his head gingerly, and came away with bloody fingers. He looked up and waited for his eyes to focus before realising what was happening. "Oh, crap!" He grabbed the stick again and yanked it back sharply. Suddenly sober, the Captain clung on to the back of Tintin's seat and watched as the cloud gave way and the ground rushed up to meet them.

At the last minute the plane pulled up and coasted, low to the ground. A vast sand-dune rose and something happened – _the tip of the dune must have clipped the pontoons, _the Captain thought to himself as he started praying once more.

The plane rocked forwards and Tintin fought to keep it under control, his teeth gritted and his hands white-knuckled on the lever as he pulled for all his worth. But it was no good: the knock had loosened something in the engine – probably the ignition lead again – and the pontoons made tentative contact with the sandy ground.

For a second they glided smoothly over the sand, and Tintin thought that they would be alright, but the pontoons weren't designed for skating on sand: they were sharply pointed for cutting through waves. The points struck a hard bank of sand or rock and the whole plane flipped over. The Captain was flung around again, while Tintin simply grabbed Snowy and held him tightly, eyes closed against the fluffy white fur.

The plane landed on its back and skid another few feet. One propeller snapped clear off and whizzed away, slicing the air as it went. When the plane stopped skidding and all had been silent for a few seconds, Tintin opened his eyes.

He was upside down, held in place by his seatbelt, but he was still alive. Under his fingers he could feel Snowy's heartbeat, and when the ringing in his ears died away he could hear the dog's frantic cries of fear and confusion. "Captain?" he said tentatively.

Behind him, something groaned. He managed to put Snowy down on the ground – _roof? We're upside down, aren't we?_ – and unlocked his seatbelt. He crumpled out of the seat and quickly got to his knees. Behind him, the Captain had managed to crawl over to the door. The handle was warped and the door was stuck, but a few well-placed bangs with the heel of his hand soon sorted that, and before the cock-pit had time to fill with black smoke the door was open. Coughing and spluttering, they crawled out and collapsed on the sand a few feet away. Turning over, Tintin could see that the underside of the plane was on fire, the flames slowly creeping towards the engine.

"It's a miracle," the Captain said faintly. "It's a bloody miracle."

"Good heavens," Tintin said, springing to his feet, "the pilots are still inside!" He rushed back to the plane, ignoring the Captain's shouts and Snowy's frantic barks, and dove back in to the cockpit, shielding himself from the flames with his left arm. Before the fire spread much further, he had hauled one of the unconscious pilots out and gone back for the second.

"Drag them away from the plane," he ordered, his voice hoarse. He grabbed one of the men by his feet and struggled away. The Captain did the same for the other, and they laid them side by side away from the plane.

Tintin collapsed back on to the sand and watched the plane burn. He was bloody annoyed, although he was doing his hardest to control his temper. He wasn't used to losing it, but he also wasn't used to hanging out with a drunk with a death-wish. He cast a side-long glance at the Captain and resolved to ditch him at the nearest town. He'd go on by himself: he didn't need the trouble and it was easier to work alone.

_So where's the nearest town?_ He took stock of their surroundings for the first time since they'd crashed. The only thing he could see was the plane. And sand.

Lots and lots of sand.

It stretched out before them like a golden ocean, broken here and there by waves of sand that towered solidly over the stark, blazing landscape. Above them, the sky was blue and free of clouds, and somehow reminded him of old movies about the Egyptians, and things like that. It looked vaguely familiar, but he couldn't decide if it was a dreamscape from a nightmare or something he'd seen in a book.

"This doesn't look like Spain," he said at last.

"Er, it should be," the Captain offered.

"What deserts are in Spain?"

"Desert?" The Captain looked white and shaken at the word.

From off to the right, they heard Snowy barking. It was different from before. Before, it had been clearly frightened: now he sounded quite happy. He appeared, running merrily over the top of a sand-dune, his stubby tail waving in delight and a giant bone trailing lopsidedly from his mouth. Tintin got to his feet again, more impressed at the tenacity of Snowy's grip than anything else.

"Where'd you find that, boy?" He held his hands out to Snowy, palms out and fingers spread wide. "Show me!"

Snowy got a better grip on the bone, looking up cheekily at Tintin as he danced out of reach of the hands. _Hands take bones. Not this time!_ He trotted away slyly, and was pleased to see Tintin and the Tall-Human-Man following him. He led them over the dune and down the opposite side, to where the Lots Of Bones lay waiting for him to eat them. He sat beside them, proud of his discovery.

"Is that… is that a horse?" the Captain ventured.

Tintin nudged the oddly-shaped skull with his foot and sighed. "No," he replied dully, "it's a camel."

"A camel?" The Captain looked surprised. "I didn't realise there were camels in Spain."

"We're not in Spain. I think we're in the middle of the Sahara Desert." Tintin put his hands in his pockets and viewed the bones calmly. Beside him, the Captain's face blanched on all colour as he gripped his hair.

"The Sahara?" he said in a small voice. "The… The _Sahara?_ Then.. then that camel died of… died of…"

"Died of thirst," Tintin finished. _Well, this makes things a bit more difficult, that's for sure._ Behind them, over the dune and out of sight, the flames finally reached the engine of the plane and it exploded, showering the sand with debris and sending a great plume of smoke up into the sky. The Captain jumped and looked back over his shoulder, his eyes wide and fearful. Tintin didn't bother to look round.

After all, cool people don't look back at explosions.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Sorry this is a little late. I was trying to prepare a good excuse for it, but I can't. I spent the day playing video games and watching _Game of Throne_s and just forgot. Sorry!

There was a pilot, the one from _The Black Island_, who was featured in several 'interviews' in the _Tintin_ comic strip. His name was, in fact, Major Wings.


	9. Chapter 9

**Nine**

* * *

><p>By the time they'd gotten back to the plane their prisoners had gone. The ropes, frayed and burnt through by the flames that roared merrily over the gutted carcass of the plane, lay on the sand beside two sets of footprints that disappeared deeper into the desert. Or out of the desert. They couldn't tell which it was: without the plane they had no dashboard, and no dashboard meant no compass, and no compass meant that nobody knew which way was which. For all Tintin knew, the pilots could be heading deeper in to the desert, while the nearest town was in the opposite direction.<p>

_There's an app for that,_ Tintin thought to himself as he remembered that his iPad had been left in a hotel in Nieuwpoort and his iPhone had been gone when he'd woken up in the bowels of the _Karaboudjan_. Both had probably been stolen by now. Well, the iPhone had definitely been stolen. He had slightly more faith in the staff of the hotel, but not much. Not that it mattered: they were in the middle of the Sahara Desert with no clue where to go and no compass to guide them. Maybe, when darkness fell, they'd be able to navigate using the stars. They _should_ be: he knew a bit – enough to recognise the North Star and a few of the constellations – but the Captain was, after all, a sailor, and should know more.

Tintin sneaked a look at the man. They were walking aimlessly, having chosen a direction and stuck to it, but the Captain was starting to trudge. He had taken off his thick woollen jumper and was in his undershirt and braces, while Tintin, having shed his jacket before his epic swim, had simply opened all the buttons on his polo shirt and tied his black and white P.L.O. scarf over his head. He wasn't holding up too badly, but the Captain was dehydrated from drinking so much booze and was starting to wear out. Beside them, Snowy had kept a grip on the giant bone he'd liberated from the camel skeleton and was trotting along determinedly. At the start, Tintin had noticed a definite 'kick' to the dog's steps: every few paces Snowy's right back-leg would jump, like a happy little skip. Now, even he was starting to lag. He'd long since stopped skipping and the bone was listing alarmingly to one side.

"Y'know," the Captain said suddenly. Tintin turned his head and looked at him. "If her name hadn't been 'Sandra'," the Captain continued thoughtfully, "I probably would have forgotten her already."

Tintin stopped dead, staring, as the Captain broke down, doubling over and bracing his hands on his knees as a fit of laughter took him. "Get it?" he said through his laughs. "Come on! _Sand! Sand_-ra! We're in a desert?"

"That's so lame." Tintin turned away as a grin spread across his face.

"Ah, that was funny!" The Captain straightened up, still smiling broadly, and they continued walking. "You just have no sense of humour."

"Knock knock."

"Who's there?"

"Daisy."

"Daisy who?"

"Daisy me rollin'; dey hatin'!" Tintin fist-pumped enthusiastically with the punch-line.

"Oh Christ! That's terrible!" The Captain shook his head in mock disgust. "Thundering typhoons, that was bloody awful!"

"'_Thundering typhoons'?" _Tintin asked with a hoot of laughter.

"Shut up. What's brown and sticky?"

"Thundering typhoons! I don't know!"

"A stick."

"Ha! Ah, that's a good one! How do you make a Venetian blind?"

"Dunno."

"Poke him in the eyes."

The Captain laughed appreciatively. "Poke him in the eyes! That's good! Hey, how do you make a hormone?"

"I don't know."

"Slap her in the face."

"Oh my lord!"

"What's pink and squishy and belongs to grandma?"

Tintin shook his head, unable to speak through his giggles.

"Granddad."

**x**

Four hours later they were out of jokes and out of energy. "I'm sorry, I can't go on." The Captain simply keeled over, going down on to his knees before laying flat out, face down on the sand. "Go on without me," he said, his voice muffled. "But carry me with you."

Tintin sat down heavily on the sand beside the Captain. Snowy flopped down in the shade Tintin cast. The bone fell to the sand but the dog simply stared at it, panting loudly, too tired to eat his prize.

"I need a drink," the Captain groaned. "I'm so thirsty."

"We can rest here for a bit," Tintin replied.

"I don't need rest: I need a drink!"

"Try not to think about it."

"Ice cold water… A can of _Coke_ right out of the fridge… poured into a glass with ice cubes… a dash of rum…"

Tintin groaned and struggled back to his feet. He couldn't sit here and listen to the Captain talking about drinks and water and ice: he'd drive himself mad with thirst. He climbed laboriously to the top of the tall sand dune looked out across the sand. From up here, he could see for miles around, and the only thing he could see was more sand, stretching for as far as the eye could see. An empty horizon, broken only by more dunes that towered up higher than the one he was standing on. Not a single indication that there was any town nearby, or even an oasis.

Once it got dark, it would be easier to see if they were near a town: the lights would show up in the night, and night in the desert would be very, _very _dark.

In the shade of the dune, the Captain cooled down slowly. His throat was burning with thirst. What had started off as an annoying, itchy sensation had built up into an intolerable dryness that tore at his throat with each breath he took. His hands and legs felt heavy, and his knees were killing him. And he was lightheaded. When he closed his eyes he could see white dots dancing on the back of his eyelids. It looked almost pretty.

He opened his eyes and gazed up at the clear, unbroken blue sky and the undercut of the dune above him. That's what the wind did: a small clump of sand would get caught behind a rock in high-winds – because the desert was a dangerous place, and if the sun and heat didn't kill you, the sandstorms would flay the skin from your bones – and over time more and more sand was caught behind the first lot, and it would grow and grow into an enormous, shifting mound. A wave of sand, slowly making its way across the ocean of sand.

There were loads around here. That meant there were loads of sandstorms.

He sat up and looked around. He was so thirsty. _Why_ was he so thirsty? _Where's Allan? He should have brought my whisky by now._ The Captain got unsteadily to his feet and looked around. He'd have to find his own whisky now. _Maybe it's up these stairs. I seem to remember that the holds are on the middle decks. This isn't my room, so I must be down in the engine room. That explains the heat. _

He tottered up the steel steps, his heavy boots clattering loudly in the confines of the small ship's corridor. At the top of the stairs was another large room. Behind him, the noise of the engine room faded a little, and became a familiar background hum.

_This doesn't look familiar. _He frowned as he looked around the new room. It was much bigger than it should be. It _should_ have brought him to a new corridor, with doors to the various holds off each side. The whisky would be in one of the smaller ones that held the ship's provisions. The rest of the holds would have held the cargo. He shook his head and sighed. He must have taken a wrong turn.

He turned to go back down the stairs when he spotted something.

_Aaah! A bottle of champagne! A bloody big one, too! Gosh, it had to be at least five foot tall. Excellent! Not quite Loch Lomond, but it would have to do. _He rubbed his hands in anticipation before reaching around the large neck of the bottle and tried to twist the cork out.

_Hmm. Bit stuck, to be sure. I'd better really squeeze and twist…_

Tintin hadn't been expecting it. He'd been standing, his back turned to the Captain, watching the horizon and trying to forget his thirst, when something closed around his neck and started to choke him. He fought back at once, and in the struggle lost his footing in the loose sand. He slid, dragging whatever was attacking him down as they slithered to the bottom of the dune, tumbling and flailing. He landed on his back, and the Captain landed on top of him.

"Cap-Captain!" he gasped, winded. He tried to push the heavier man off him.

"Bloody corks," the Captain mumbled. He straddled Tintin and wrapped his hands around his neck again. "Can never get them out when you need to. Where's that damned corkscrew?"

Tintin tore at the Captain's arms and hands, trying to loosen the man's grip, but it was no use. The Captain was bigger and stronger: barrel chested and with an iron grip. He was muscular in the way labourers and farmers were; untrained but used to doing heavy lifting and hard work. Reaching for the Captain's face, Tintin tried to force the man away.

Snowy knew a Thing was happening. The Tall-Human-Man was on top of Tintin, and Tintin didn't look happy. Not like when Snowy sat on Tintin and licked him first thing in the morning. That made Tintin happy, and the shouting was only an expression of how happy Snowy made Tintin. This time, Tintin was making strange noises that Snowy didn't like. It was up to Snowy to stop the Tall-Human-Man from doing a Thing. He grabbed the bone – he wasn't sure what he was going to do, but he wasn't leaving his bone behind to do it: a cat might steal it – and thought for a bit.

Eating the bone sounded like a good idea, but that wouldn't stop the Tall-Human-Man from doing a Thing.

He could _give _the bones to the Tall-Human-Man, but that would mean that Snowy wouldn't get to eat it. That wouldn't be good…

Snowy didn't know what to do. His head spinning and starting to get hurty, he decided to give the bone to Tintin and let him decide. He pushed the bone into the Tall-Human-Man's face, roughly bashing him in the Big Nose.

Captain Haddock recoiled at the sudden pain in his nose, his eyes watering, and swatted at the dog. "Get on, Snowy! Stop that! Can't you see I'm" – _What? What am I doing?_ He moved over as Tintin pushed him off, collapsing to the side as he wondered what the hell he'd been doing. _It was something important. What was it?_

Gasping for air, Tintin rolled away. His throat felt raw, and it hurt when he swallowed. "What the hell were you thinking?" he demanded, his voice hoarse. "Captain, what are you doing?"

"I don't believe it." The Captain had gone perfectly still and was staring off into the distance. Cautiously, wary of taking his attention off the man that had just tried to strangle him, Tintin glanced towards what the Captain was staring at, but saw only sand.

"There's nothing there, Captain," he said.

"Look!" The Captain pointed. Again, Tintin risked a glance, but could only see the same desert landscape that had always been there. "A lake!" The Captain jumped up. "Water! At last!"

"What? Captain there's no – Captain! Come back!"

The Captain had taken off, running at a shambling gait that picked up speed with every step. Barking, Snowy rushed after him, wondering what all the fuss was about. It was the cardinal rule of Being a Dog: if something or somebody runs; chase them and see what they were running for. After all, it might be a game and games are fun.

The Captain's braces, lost in the struggle, trailed behind him. Snowy decided that they were what the Tall-Human-Man was running from. They had to be stopped. They had scared the Tall-Human-Man in some way and Snowy must save him and defeat the Trailing Things before they turned on Tintin. He lunged and grabbed them before digging his feet into the sand and trying to pull the Captain back. He was growling, secretly enjoying vanquishing the Things.

The dog was dragged quite a distance, with Tintin futilely trying to call him off, before the braces snapped and both dog and man went flying. The Captain went forward in a sort of dive, landing face-first in the sand, while Snowy shot into a backwards roll. Dazed, Snowy lay completely still for a second as Tintin shot passed on his way to help the Captain up. Then, assured that he was still alive, the dog picked up the braces and ran away with them.

"Captain, there's no lake," Tintin said as he helped the man to his feet.

"But I saw it, clear as day!"

"Just a mirage."

"A what? Do they still exist?"

"Yes. Believe me, Captain, there's nothing there."

"Oh God. I'm so thirsty."

"Don't start that again. And try not to strangle me again."

The Captain dusted himself down and looked sheepish. "Sorry. Don't know what I was thinking. Is my nose bleeding?"

"No." Tintin rubbed at his throat. If anything, he was thirstier now. "We have to go on," he said regretfully. "We can't stop here. We must keep walking until nightfall."

"When is that?"

Tintin looked around at the sky. It was still the same shade of rich blue as it always had been, and the sun was still high in the sky. "I don't know," he said honestly. "I just don't know."

**x**

The Captain lasted another four hours before collapsing again, and this time he didn't get back up. Without any other options, and loathe to leave the man to die alone, Tintin sat down and waited.


	10. Chapter 10

**Ten**

* * *

><p>The waves lapped lazily at the shore of the beach, the golden sand darkening with the salty moisture. By the time the waves had drawn back and begun their gentle rush forward again, the sand had almost dried to the same golden colour as before. The heat here was tremendous, but somehow Tintin was able to bare it. It was comfortable: the heat of San Lucia perhaps, or maybe even Turkey. He couldn't remember any more. He'd travelled so far and so often that sometimes the places blended into one another, and when he woke up he'd have to take a few seconds to remember where he was.<p>

He was lying on his back on a beach towel. He'd pushed his beach parasol back, the better to soak up the sun and top up his tan – he was always careful and wore sunscreen, so he wasn't overly worried about his skin. He knew the dreaded ginger-gene was notorious for producing pale-skinned creatures that wilted and pealed in strong sun, but his reddy-blond hair had come with decent skin that took to the sun quite well. He rarely burned and tended to tan quite easily.

The beach was almost deserted. Further down, on the other end of it, he could see the model Noémie Lenoir having an animated chat with Snowy while an enormous cat dressed as Robin Hood lifted weights. In the far distance, the tell-tale fog drifted in. _Well, here come the zombies,_ he thought to himself. _I'd better get out of here. It's a shame they ruin everything. _

An ear-splitting roar broke the hazy lethargy of the beach as Captain Haddock pulled up on a shiny red motorbike, throwing sand backwards as he went. He stopped the bike and got off, his every movement exaggerated like a vaudeville villain in a black and white movie. He put his hand over his eyes and looked carefully around the beach, ignoring Noémie, Snowy, Robin Hood and the approaching zombie-fog.

"Oho!" he said, when he finally spied Tintin – who was lying only a few feet away, and should have been noticeable from the get-go. "There's a bottle of wine!"

Tintin looked around. The zombie-fog was getting closer. He'd have to move soon. But now he had the extraordinary feeling that if he ran fast enough he'd be able to fly. _They can't get me if I fly away._ But nowhere did he see a bottle of wine. "What are you talking about?" he asked curiously. "Where do you see a bottle?"

The Captain was growing larger and larger. He loomed over Tintin as he seized the boy by the throat, one enormous hand wrapping easily around his neck. The other produced a cork-screw. "I'll have to open it," he said, ignoring Tintin's question.

Tintin tried to get away, but his arms and legs weren't responding. He looked down and saw that his body had been replaced by a glass bottle, his head protruding from the neck where the cork should be. He looked up in time to see the twisty, rusted metal cork-screw bearing down on his head, and shouted out in alarm.

"Somebody help me!"

His arm hit something hard – very hard – at the elbow, and he opened his eyes with a shout of pain. He was lying on a hard, concrete floor beside a low bed. The bedding was in disarray, as though someone had tried to build a fort in it, or had been wrestling with the thin, scratchy blanket. Snowy stared at him in alarm, stubby tail wagging frantically. The door to the room opened and a strange man – Middle Eastern judging by his dress and colour – entered quickly, a rifle pointed at Tintin. "You need help?" the man asked urgently.

"Oh God!" Tintin said, still breathing heavily. "No, sorry. Just a nightmare."

The man slung his rifle back over his shoulder and nodded. "This happens. You were long time in desert."

"Where am I?" Tintin asked as he got to his feet and untangled his legs from the blanket. "What is this place? Am I…" He paused and squinted at the man. "Am I dead?" he asked nervously.

"No, not dead," the man said with a grin. "We find you last night, out in the desert. You come with me, to the Lieutenant. He will explain."

Tintin pushed his bare feet into his shoes and followed the man out into a sun-drenched courtyard that lay within high, stone walls. Men patrolled the ramparts here and there, each armed with a rifle. Some wore British army uniforms, others wore similar outfits to his guide. Nobody paid him much attention beyond a few curious glances and he couldn't see the Captain anywhere. The man led him to another small, brick building. Inside, a long desk took up most of the room and a red-headed man in a loose white shirt and black trousers sat behind it. He looked up, a pipe clamped between his teeth, as Tintin was shown in.

"He's awake, sir," the Middle Eastern man said. "The young boy."

"Ah! Good!" The man stood up and came around the desk, his hand held out. Tintin took it and shook it. "Glad to see you on your feet! My name is Lieutenant Delacourt. I'm in command of this outpost."

"Pleased to meet you. My name is Tintin. But where are we?"

The Lieutenant gestured to a chair and Tintin sat down gratefully as the man took his own seat again. "Afghar," he said with a grimace. "Dreadful place, but better here than Afghanistan, what-what?" He spoke with a clipped English accent that came straight from a public school.

"How did I get here?" Tintin asked.

"Well, about mid-day yesterday we noticed a column of smoke rising up there from the south. We immediately thought it might be an aeroplane – happens sometimes, you know: poor buggers get disorientated and come down – so I sent out a patrol and they found you. You were unconscious so they brought you back here. Apparently your dog barked until they found you. Clever boy, hmm?" Snowy looked up and wagged his tail again before hopping up onto Tintin's lap.

"Did they find my friend?" Tintin asked.

"Big bearded chap?" the Lieutenant asked. "Yes they – Ah! Here he is now!" He stood up again and hurried around his desk to the door. Tintin turned and looked over his shoulder to see the Lieutenant shaking hands with a wary and silent Captain Haddock. "Good to see you! Lieutenant Delacour at your service. Regular army."

"Captain Haddock," the Captain said as he took the seat next to Tintin. "Navy."

"Merchant or army?"

"Was army, now merchant. I'm in import-export."

"I see. And did you see any action?" the Lieutenant asked.

"My last stint was in the Falklands," the Captain admitted.

"Bit of a hairy conflict, that one. Never been fond of the Argentines, myself. A very boorish people, you know."

"Yeah, well, you know how it is when the uppity natives want their land back," the Captain said with a grin. Tintin frowned at him, wondering about the hard glint in the older man's eyes.

"Exactly right," the Lieutenant agreed. "Ahmed," he called, and the man that had escorted Tintin reappeared at the door. "Bring three glasses and a drink for us." The man, Ahmed, nodded stiffly and disappeared for a moment, returning with a tray containing some glasses and a bottle of rum. He placed it on the desk and bowed to them before leaving, closing the door behind him.

"So, was the smoke from a plane, then?" the Lieutenant asked as he began to pour the rum.

"Yes," Tintin replied. "We came down with quite a bump and the plane flipped over before bursting into flames. Oh, no thank you," he said, covering his own glass with his hand before the Lieutenant could pour him a measure of rum, "I don't drink spirits."

"Oh? Fair enough." The Lieutenant made to pour some rum into the Captain's glass, who stared regretfully at the bottle. "No thanks," the Captain said heavily. "I think I'll pass too."

"Well, I won't press you," the Lieutenant said with a shrug. "Now, you were saying?" He tipped his glass to Tintin and took a long swallow. The Captain watched sorrowfully.

"You certainly saved our lives," Tintin continued. "We were walking all day, but we didn't know where we were going or even if there were outposts or towns nearby. Without you and your men we would have died of thirst."

"That's why you ought to have a drink with me," the Lieutenant said with a grin as he refilled his own glass. "But what brings you to this Godforsaken land in the first place?"

"We were at sea," Tintin said smoothly. He didn't want to get into any great detail with the Lieutenant, regardless of how the man had saved their lives, "and we were hit by a storm. Our only way out of it was to take the seaplane and try to find land."

"Ah, yes, those storms. They caught a few ships yesterday. A couple went down. One went down with everyone trapped on board."

Tintin frowned. "Really? That's awful."

"Yes, can't remember the name of the tugger now. Some odd name. Hang on, it might be on the news: they're attempting to search for the crew at the moment." The Lieutenant nodded to something behind them, and they turned to see a television mounted in a wall bracket in the corner of the room, near the door. He turned it on and the picture flickered into life, showing an expanse of choppy ocean, with three ships and a number of life boats converged on a particular spot. An English woman was providing the commentary to the scene.

"… comes in the wake of the sinking of the _Tanganyika, _near Vigo, whose crew escaped before the ship sank. A few miles along the coast is the wreck of the _Jupiter_, driven into the rocks and lodged there. They too received the distress call from the _Karaboudjan_" –

"_Karaboudjan?"_ Tintin and the Captain said together.

– "but were unable to offer assistance, letting the _Benares _take the helm on the rescue mission. However, by the time the _Benares_ reached the last known co-ordinates of the _Karaboudjan _there was no sign of the ship or her crew, who are believed to have gone down with her. At the helm of the _Karaboudjan _was Captain Archibald Haddock" – here a picture of the Captain, smiling and wearing a naval uniform flashed onto the screen – "a native of London. His First Mate, Allan Thompson," – the picture of the Captain was replaced by one of Allan – "was an American who had spent the last twenty years in Europe. Neither family was available for comment. Next up, a man who was attacked by an Alsatian puppy tells us of his adorable ordeal."

"Oh _hell!"_ The Captain sat back and covered his face with his hands. "Blistering barnacles, what a week!"

"That's a bit odd, don't you think?" Tintin said suddenly. "The _Karaboudjan _sinking?" The Lieutenant was staring at them in confusion, but passed no remark.

"Damn straight," the Captain said loudly. "That ship wasn't a cockleshell, and Allan is no fool. There's no way she sank without time to launch the lifeboats. I'd stake my own life on that."

"That's probably not worth much, considering that you're dead," the Lieutenant pointed out. "Officially, anyway."

"Good point, that man. I don't believe that the _Karaboudjan _went down. Not like that, and not so damned suddenly."

"Neither do I," Tintin agreed. "Lieutenant, is there anyway we can leave today? We have to get to the coast as soon as possible."

"So soon? Well, it can be done but I wouldn't advise it. You're both probably still dehydrated, and going back out there would be dangerous. But, if you're certain that you have to leave then it can be done. It should be enough if I send two guides with you: that whole area has been clear for weeks."

"Who are you fighting out here?" the Captain asked curiously.

"Terrorists," said the Lieutenant. "The Taliban. Middle Eastern oil companies. You know: the usual."

**x**

"What a git," the Captain said gruffly. They were mounted on camels and plodding slowly out of the compound with two armed guides, who were riding ahead. Tintin grinned and waved back at the Lieutenant.

"He's not so bad," Tintin said. "He saved our lives."

"Then he's a git with some redeeming features. That doesn't make him any less of a git."

"Why do you dislike him?"

"Because. He's a git. Oh, it's not him: it's everything he stands for." The Captain waved his hand flippantly. "Public-school boy. Posh twat that joins the army. Probably still salutes the flag and dreams of doing glory for the Empire."

Tintin shrugged. "Isn't that the point?"

"No it bloody isn't!" the Captain snapped. "Look around you, lad. Do you think England has any claims on this place? And look at how he treats his own second in command."

"I thought he was polite."

"He was disrespectful. Making a Muslim carry a bottle of booze for us to get pissed up on? Disgraceful. That sort of man treats people of other races like shi- er, rubbish, because he believes them to be savages compared to the great and noble Englishman. That sort of attitude went out with the dodo. He's a throwback. He's the sort of jingoistic twat that gives the army a bad name."

"Huh," said Tintin. "I never thought about it like that."

"Daddy probably paid for his commission. I'd bet all his ancestors sent soldiers to die in every war England has ever been in."

"What do you mean; _'__paid for his commission'_?"

"There's two types of officers, Tintin."

"An officer and a gentleman?" Tintin offered with a grin.

"No," the Captain said witheringly. "There's the ones that start off at the bottom and fight their way to the top because they show ingenuity, tenacity, and a good head for strategy; and the rich ones that never start off as enlisted men because their wealth and military background demands that they rise to the rank of officer straight away." The Captain shook his head in disgust. "I had to fight for my rank. I worked my way up to Captain under my own steam. Nobody ever gave me anything for free. And they could have: there's been a Haddock in the British navy since the beginning of the British navy. We're old-school."

"Why did you leave the navy?"

The Captain shrugged. "Didn't have the heart for it any more."

"But you stayed at sea?"

"Aye. Might as well. Nothing for me back on land."

"You never married?"

"Yeah, but that didn't end well. No offence, kid, but let's change the subject, eh? Unless you want to talk about yourself?"

"What do you want to know?" Tintin asked.

"How old are you?"

"Hey, is that a palm tree?" Tintin pointed ahead. There was, in fact, a single palm tree showing its spiky head above the horizon of a small sand dune in the distance.

"Yeah, I think it is," the Captain agreed.

"I wonder if this is the well of Bir Khegg already," Tintin said. He harried his camel and the beast picked up speed, taking the lad forward to catch up with the guides. "Hang on: I'll go and check."

"He's a canny little sod," the Captain muttered. "Bloody genius at changing the subject."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Sacrificing Lieutenant Delacourt's good name for the Captain's character development _like a boss._


	11. Chapter 11

**Eleven**

* * *

><p>They stopped to water their camels at the closest oasis, which turned out not to be the well of Bir Kheg, like Tintin had thought. That well lay over forty five miles away. They went slowly but steadily; the camels kept their plodding, ponderous pace under the blazing sun. By the time the sky had begun to darken they were over half-way to the well, and only three days from the city of Bagghar. Bagghar was one of the largest ports in Morocco, and the next port of call for the <em>Karaboudjan<em>. If they were to find the _Karaboudjan _anywhere, the Captain had insisted, they would find her there, and Tintin found himself agreeing.

_In any case,_ he thought to himself, _I can ditch the Captain there with no regrets. There's a big airport there, and a port. He can make his own way home and I can continue the chase without fear of his drunken stupidity. _

The Captain had been quiet since they'd left the British army outpost. After their initial conversation he'd hung back, leaving Tintin to make conversation with their Middle Eastern Muslim guides.

Behind the trio, the Captain reached into his saddle pack and pulled out a bottle of port as quietly as he could. He didn't want anyone to know he'd nicked a couple of bottles from Lieutenant Delacourt's office, and he certainly didn't want Tintin to see him getting drunk in the company of Muslims, after his previous condemnation of the Lieutenant for doing the same. But it was just so _boring_ here. Miles and miles of sand for as far as the eye could see. Every so often there was a rock. He felt like he was on the world's dullest sightseeing holiday. Might as well get drunk: at least it broke the monotony and livened things up.

He raised the bottle and took a sneaky swallow, gulping down a couple of mouthfuls as quickly as he could. Vaguely, he heard a loud _pop_, and then he was covered in glass and liquid. He opened his eyes and realised he was holding air. The bottle was gone, and he couldn't figure out quite what had happened.

"Berbers!" one of the guides shouted. "Quick, over here!" He led them to a large dune and forced his camel to its knees. "We must dismount," he was saying. The Captain's stomach lurched as his own camel, clearly following the rest of the pack's lead, dipped forward and kneeled down. He tumbled off as the saddle swayed with the action. In a heartbeat he was on his feet again, brushing the broken glass from his chest and seizing his rifle – and a new bottle – from his pack. "Scoundrels!" he shouted. "Barbarians! No respect!"

"And the Lieutenant said this area was safe," Tintin said wryly as he scrambled into position. He dropped to his stomach and crawled up to the top of the dune. Peeking over the top, he took careful aim. He was only visible for a second, but that was all it took as one of the Berbers chose him as a target and started shooting. Gun cocked and ready, Tintin raised his head again and found the man that had picked him out. He steadied his aim and loosed off a single shot. The bullet found its mark, kicking sand up into the Berber's face. With a grin, Tintin quickly fired another shot. This time, the bullet was even closer, almost hitting the Berber's rifle and blinding him with a cloud of fine sand. The man swore loudly in Arabic and ducked out of sight.

"Not bad shooting, huh, Snowy?" Tintin asked happily.

Unbeknownst to them, one of the attacking Berbers had crawled around behind them and was taking up position. He waited for a few seconds, scanning his enemies as he decided which one was more dangerous. Tintin, he decided, was the best shot of all of them, and should therefore be removed from the situation as soon as possible. He took a deep breath and took careful aim.

His first shot went wide, smashing the bottle of whisky the Captain had propped in the sand between himself and Tintin. The Captain stared at the remnants, his jaw dropping in shock. He felt its loss keenly.

"Damn it!" Tintin turned over and sat up, aiming his rifle at the new threat. He took a few shots but they went over the Berber's head as the man stood up and, in a crouch, retreated to a safer distance.

The Captain couldn't stop staring at the broken bottle. That was two. Two bottles in less than five minutes. Gone. Just like that. All gone, with no thought to anyone. "You bastards," he said softly. "You utter, _utter_ bastards!"

"There's too many," Tintin said urgently as he reloaded his gun. "I think it's time to start praying, Captain. Captain?" He looked around. The Captain was holding a handful of wet sand, watching as clumps of it fell from his grasp.

"That was the last of the whisky," the Captain said in a strangely calm voice. "There's no more whisky."

"The hell with your whisky, Captain," Tintin cried. "Start shooting!"

"Revenge," said the Captain.

"What? Your gun, Captain, use your gun!"

"Revenge!"

"Captain" –

"_Revenge!"_ The Captain jumped up, holding his rifle by the barrel, and ran towards the Berbers. Tintin watched, dumbfounded. _"Swine! Jellyfish! Tramp-balls! Troglodytes! Bastards!" _

"Captain! What are you doing? You'll get yourself killed!" Tintin shouted. "Get down! For the love of God, _get down!"_

"_Aztecs! Toads! Carpet-baggers! Iconoclasts!"_

Bullets whizzed over his head and around him, blurring the air but miraculously missing him. "What saint watches over drunkards?" Tintin asked in awe.

"_Rats! Ectoplasms! Fresh-water swabs! Cannibals! Bashi-bazouks! Catepillars!"_

Tintin watched, amazed, as the Berbers jumped up one by one and ran from the Captain. "Great snakes! He's got them on the run!" The Captain, a tiny figure in the distance, chased them barefoot over the sand still swinging his rifle as a club. The Berbers scrambled over the top of a far dune and disappeared from sight. The Captain made it to the top and sent a final flurry of curses after them. He cut a dashing figure – almost Laurence of Arabia-like – as he shouted; "Yeah, you'd better run, you pack of pockmarks! And if you come back you'll feel my rifle butt!" He swung his rifle viciously, and managed to bash himself in the back of the head. Tintin was on his feet and running towards him as the Captain toppled forward. By the time he'd reached him, the man was sitting up and rubbing his head.

"You did it, Captain! You did it!" Tintin shouted in delight. "You were wonderful!"

"Did I get 'em all?" the Captain asked. "What about the one that snuck up behind me and tried to bash my brains in? The pirate!" They jumped at a loud whooping noise that sounded behind them, and the top of the dune exploded into a cloud of dust as Lieutenant Delacourt appeared with his men, each atop a camel. "Charge!" the Lieutenant shouted. "After them! Take them prisoner!"

"Oh," said the Captain. "It's him. Then… then it wasn't me that got rid of them? It was the Lieutenant?"

"Don't worry, Captain," Tintin said, patting the man on the arm, "you're still my hero!"

The Lieutenant wheeled his camel around and trotted back to them. "We showed up in the nick of time, what-what?" he asked with a grin.

"What are you doing here?" Tintin asked, craning his neck to get a better view of the man. "I thought we were on our own."

The Lieutenant dismounted easily, simply dropping down from the camel's back without waiting for it to kneel. "We got a warning from HQ about raiders near Kefheir," he explained. "We jumped into the saddle right away and here we are. As soon as my men return with the prisoners we'll all ride north together. Believe me, with my boys with you, you'll have no more trouble!"

**x**

The Lieutenant was as good as his word, and Tintin and the Captain found themselves in the middle of a heaving caravan of camel riders. It was strange, they thought, to see British army soldiers in full uniform on the backs of bored camels, but the Lieutenant said that it was the easiest form of transport in the desert.

"The armoured vehicles are safer," he said thoughtfully, "but they break down too easily. The sand gets everywhere, and if you find yourself stranded without an engineer you're as good as dead. Camels never break down, and as long as you have a gun and know where to find water, you'll arrive safely."

That night they made camp under the clear, open sky. _The stars shine brighter here than back home,_ Tintin thought.

"No other lights," the Captain said. They were sitting apart from the others, who were horsing around and letting off steam, or guarding the small camp from hostile outsiders and scavengers. "It's the same as out at sea. Once you get away from the cities and the lights and the noise, the sky clears and you can see all the stars."

"Do you know them?" Tintin asked curiously.

The Captain shrugged. "A few. More than most, I suppose."

"I suppose you have to learn, when you are at sea?"

The Captain gave him a funny look. "Why?"

"For navigation?"

"No, that's what the Global Positioning System does. And maps."

"But don't you have to chart your position using the stars?"

"What am I? A bloody pirate or something? No, I just use the computer!" The Captain started to snigger. "You do realise that ships have come a long way since the eighteen hundreds, right?"

Tintin grinned. "I guess I prefer to think that sailors still use the stars to keep on course."

"Romantic bull… Hooey."

"Bull-hooey?"

"Moderating my language," the Captain said morosely.

"It's not as good as 'blistering barnacles'," Tintin replied. "I like that one."

"You leave my barnacles alone. So what's your story?" the Captain asked.

"I don't have one," Tintin said idly. "I'm just the guy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"You could just go home," the Captain suggested.

"I'm a reporter: we don't just 'go home'," Tintin said with a laugh. "We find out what's going on first."

"How long have you been a reporter?"

"A while now. I started out in France and went back to Belgium when I went free-lance." Tintin brought his knees up under his chin and hugged them to his chest. It was cold now that the sun was gone. "Why did you name your ship _Karaboudjan?"_

The Captain shook his head, his face sad. "My black spirit. It just summed up how I felt about the world."

"What happened to make your spirit so black? Do you mind me asking?"

"No. Uh. I guess it was after my divorce. She got pretty much everything. Including our friends. I bought a ship, named it, and buggered off." He lay back and watched the stars overhead. A second later, Tintin lay down too. They stayed like that, side by side and comfortable. "So what's your deal?" the Captain asked. "You married? Seeing anyone?"

"There's a girl I like," Tintin offered hesitantly.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"What's she like?"

"She's very pretty."

"Really?" The Captain sounded surprised. "Are you sure you're not hitting above your weight?"

"Why do you say that?" Tintin asked, puzzled.

"Y'know: you're a ginger and that. Girls don't go for gingers."

"Do they go for well-travelled, cultured men that earn good money and live in a nice flat in the better part of town?"

"Yeah, they go for that," the Captain agreed. He was silent for a moment before asking; "Does she have daddy issues?"

Tintin thought for a moment. "I don't know," he said suspiciously. "Why?"

"Listen to me, lad," the Captain said seriously. He turned his head so he could look at Tintin. "I'm going to give you the same advice my dad gave me: if you find a girl with daddy issues, don't get into a relationship with her. Just shag her a few times and move on."

"Oh my lord!"

"It's the God's honest truth. Those girls are crazy, lad, but they've got something to prove to daddy when it comes to sex. Just keep them away from sharp implements and don't introduce them to your parents."

"That's awful!"

"Awfully true."

"Goodnight, Captain," Tintin said firmly.

"G'night."

**x**

They reached Bagghar a few days later, and said goodbye to the Lieutenant and his men before entering the city. It was a large port city on the coast of Morocco; vibrant and wild and teeming with people. It was smaller than Marrakech, but just as beautiful, retaining the thin, winding streets and decorative stone arches familiar to Morocco's cities. The heart of Bagghar was the market, which was right beside the expansive docks. They strolled through the wooden stalls and crowds of shoppers and hawkers on their second day in the city.

The air was filled with unfamiliar, tantalising scents. Strange spices and herbs mixed with the stinging sent of tanned leather and tangy fruits, and above it all was the strong smell of the ocean and fresh fish. It felt good to be clean after their time in the desert, and it felt even better to be in fresh clothing that didn't stink of their own sweat.

"We should find the harbour master first," Tintin said.

The Captain nodded in agreement. "Good idea," he said. "They can give us some news about the _Karaboudjan_._"_

"Do we still think it didn't sink?"

"I don't believe it for a second. Oooh! Shrunken monkey hands! Do you think they give you three wishes?" The Captain made for a stall where several shrivelled monkey hands were laid out on faded, tacky muslin. "Although," he continued, "the wishes will eventually bite you on the arse. Did you ever read that story?"

Silence. The old man behind the stall looked at him strangely. The Captain turned around to face Tintin, but the lad was gone. "Tintin?" he asked. _Oh my God. I've dreamed this entire thing, haven't I? He was never there: he was a figment of my imagination; a spirit sent to me to guide me to – Oh, there he is!_

He stood on tiptoes and watched as Tintin, with Snowy running alongside him, disappeared into the crowd ahead. "Tintin!" he called loudly. _"Tintin! Where are you going?" _People were starting to look at him. As nonchalantly as possible, the Captain took off after his friend.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Sorry for the late update. And for some reason I always imagined that the Captain would give _terrible_ dating advice. I'm not quite sure _why_...


	12. Chapter 12

**Twelve**

* * *

><p>When they had first arrived in Bagghar and found a cheap hotel, Tintin had been determined to shake off the Captain as soon as possible. He didn't need anyone else around him when he was working, especially not someone as volatile and unpredictable as Captain Haddock. Not that Tintin didn't like the man: far from it. They'd had some good conversations while they were crossing the desert together and Tintin viewed the man as a friend. Tintin had friends – plenty of them – but he tried to keep them at a distance as much as possible. Not because he didn't enjoy their company: he did. He liked talking and hanging out just as much as anyone else. He just didn't like deflecting questions about himself constantly, and it was getting harder to find new ways to change the conversation whenever the Captain slipped a new question in.<p>

He thought about it as they strolled through the market on their way to the harbour master's office. He heard the Captain talking, but the words didn't penetrate his skull. Ahead of him, a figure had caught his eye. It was an almost-familiar figure. It took a few seconds for his brain to make the connection, but when it did he stopped dead in his tracks.

_Allan!_

It was! It was First Mate Allan of the _Karaboudjan, _and he was looking awfully well for a dead man.

His feet took over as he dove ahead, forgetting all about the Captain. He was so used to working alone, with only Snowy for company, that the Captain completely slipped his mind. All he could see was Allan's back getting further and further away as he left the market behind and turned into the thin, winding streets of Bagghar.

Tintin ran until he had narrowed the gap between himself and the First Mate. Then he slowed down and started shadowing him cautiously, ducking into doorways whenever it looked like Allan was about to turn around. But the man didn't turn around. Instead, he walked purposely, never dreaming that he was being followed. He knew where he was going too. It seemed like he knew the streets like the back of his hand. Wherever he was heading, he'd been there before.

_This could be it!_ Tintin thought. _He's going to his contact._

Ahead of him, Allan turned a corner and Tintin hurried to catch up but it was too late. The street was far from deserted – there were plenty of people walking along it – but Allan was gone. He had disappeared into one of the houses that lined the narrow street. Tintin paused for a moment, thinking his options through. If he stayed here there was a chance he would be noticed or recognised. On the other hand, he could go and try to find some sort of disguise – a burnous perhaps – and come back later.

There was something he was forgetting. He looked down at Snowy, who looked up and wagged his tail. _Crap! The Captain!_ He shook his head and turned back, heading towards the market to see if he could find his friend. With any luck, the Captain would have had the good sense to go straight to the harbour master's office.

**x**

The Captain couldn't believe his luck: somehow, he'd managed to lose the only ginger kid wearing a bright white polo shirt in Morocco. It hadn't been his fault though… Well, not _exactly_. He'd followed Tintin at a run, but some idiot selling oranges or some crap had walked out right in front of him, and the Captain had bumped into him, shouldering the wicker basket and spilling the oranges. Instead of doing what a normal person would do (mumble something vaguely polite and pick up the oranges himself, like a good Englishman), the orange seller – or whatever he was – had made a huge row and half the market had waded in to stop the Captain from 'escaping'.

Escaping. Pah! It wasn't like he'd stolen anything! By the time the police had shown up and started cracking heads, the Captain had extracted himself from the mini-riot and Tintin was long gone.

Morose and bloody annoyed, the Captain had gone to the docks, intending to go straight to the harbour master's office, but then he'd spotted a small French restaurant and felt a bit peckish. He ordered himself a bottle of wine and drank it, unable to make up his mind about which bit of foreign swill he should order with it, but by the time he'd finished the wine he wasn't hungry any more. Well, he could have gone for a Big Mac, but there didn't seem to be any kind of a burger joint around. So he'd gone back to the restaurant and ordered another bottle of wine.

_What was I doing again?_

He stared at the ashtray, his pipe balanced carefully on the edge, and tried to think. He had something important to do, but for the life of him he couldn't remember.

_Wait. Was I supposed to find McDonalds? _

No. That wasn't it. Something else.

_Find Tintin?_

Hmm. That would be hard. The Captain had tried to go after him, but the streets were maze-like and the Captain didn't know them well enough to go wandering. He'd only been to Bagghar a handful of times and most of those times were spent either on his ship or in the tourist pubs near the docks.

_Something Tintin said… Find the _Karaboudjan, _or something along those lines. _He had a vague inkling that he was too drunk for this sort of thing. His memory wasn't the best when he was sober and when he was drunk it was useless.

_The harbour master!_

The thought came to him like a bolt from the blue. _That was it! Tintin said we should go to the harbour master's office. _

Right. He had his plan. Now all he had to do was to find a way to stand up. He pushed his chair back and waited until the world stopped spinning. _Don't I need to pay for this wine first?_ he wondered. _Yes. Yes, I definitely have to do that. _

He looked around and caught sight of an older man with a huge, porn-star moustache and an apron, and called him over. "How much?" he managed to say, gesturing to the empty bottle of wine. This was the test: if he could pay and thank the man politely, he wasn't too drunk. If he fell over he was too drunk and should probably go back to the hotel to sleep it off, and hope Tintin showed up in the morning.

"Thirty five dirham," the man replied shortly.

The Captain screwed up his face and thought about the exchange rate. It wasn't actually that bad: about six quid for a bottle of decent wine. He shrugged and rooted around in his pocket for his wallet. _Hmm. Not there._ He calmly tried his other pocket. _Hmm. Not there either. _He tried the other one again, and then the other, and then started to freak out. "My wallet's been stolen!" he exclaimed. "Son of a…" He stood up and started rooting in earnest while the waiter shook his head and braced himself for trouble.

"_Police!" _the Captain roared. _"Somebody call the police!"_

"Settle down, sir," the waiter said irritably. "Shouting like that won't help!"

But it did: the restaurant opened up onto the docks, and the Captain was sitting outside at a pavement table. Further along the way two policemen were patrolling, and when they heard the Captain's shout they came running. "What's going on?" one asked gruffly. "Why all the shouting?"

"My wallet's been nicked!" the Captain shouted. "City full of bloody thieves, that's all it is! If there's a shower worse than the Germans, then it's the shower below in the market!"

"Alright," the policeman said, approaching the Captain warily, "calm down, sir, calm down." His companion followed gingerly, reaching for the billy-club he wore on his belt. They were used to dealing with drunken sailors, and this one had the look about him. As he moved forward, his foot collided with something. He looked down and saw that he had kicked something under the table. He ducked down and retrieved it before showing it to the Captain.

"Is this your wallet, sir?" he asked politely.

"Oh," said the Captain. He grinned, his drunken state of mind removing the shame and leaving him with only the comedy of the situation. "My bad."

"Take it and be quiet," the first policeman said, disgusted. "And next time we see you causing a row, it'll be straight into the drunk tank with you. Understand?"

"Aye-aye, Admiral!" The Captain tossed a couple of dirham at the waiter and saluted the two policemen. "Message received loud and clear!" He toddled off then, staggering hopefully in the direction of the hotel. He had best go and sleep it off.

**x**

About a half an hour later, the Captain realised he was going completely in the wrong direction. The hotel, he remembered, was back on the other side of the market. All he was doing was wandering along the seafront and getting in the way.

_Still, _he thought, _there's some damned fine ships here. Damned fine._

He tried to keep an eye out: sometimes you could be lucky and find a friend's ship. Some of the Captain's best nights out had come about after finding an old friend in the same port. He couldn't remember half of them, but he supposed that was the mark of a good night out. He didn't recognise any of the ships here though. There was very few of them, which was surprising when you considered the size of the port. The few ships that were in port lay scattered around the bay.

He had walked quite a bit. He was almost at the end now. Not of the dock: that curved away for almost another mile. But there were only three more ships left, and he was already level with the first of them.

The _Santa Veronica. _He didn't recognise her.

He made a vow with himself: he'd check the names of the two remaining ships, and if he didn't know either of them he'd turn around and go home. He couldn't say fairer than that, could he?

The _Fatima_. He didn't recognise her either.

It was peaceful now: the row of warehouses on the right were closed. Each piece of cargo had been stripped from the ships, and probably replaced with new crates and boxes to ship somewhere else. But the job was done, and the ships would lie overnight and be refuelled in the morning. They'd all sail before noon with the new cargo, and they could be carrying anything: food, clothes, books. The Captain had once delivered an ape to a film star. It was his only claim to fame. He knew a man that _swore_ to delivering a shipment of hamburgers to Elvis Presley, but the Captain didn't believe that. Everyone knew that the King got his burgers flown in by helicopter. The strangest thing he'd ever heard of being shipped was –

_Drugs._

_That's the _Karaboudjan.

The thought filtered through his brain as he reached the last ship. It was a relief, in a way: for the last few minutes he'd been experiencing a jarring feeling of déjà vu. It had felt like a hundred other drunken stumbles back to his ship. It had felt horribly familiar and profoundly depressing. It was almost as though his drunken feet had done what comes natural to them, and managed to find their way home at last.

He looked up, dumbfounded, at the familiar prow. The letters emblazoned across it no longer read _Karaboudjan_. Oh no: they'd taken that from him too. They'd stolen his dark spirit when they'd stolen his ship, and replaced it with a burning anger as he stared up at the golden-lettered _Djebel Amilah. _

Fury built inside of him, and his first thought was to board the ship and start cracking heads. When the red mist began to clear, he realised that it was just the drink talking. What he _needed_ to do was find the police. And if he'd learnt anything from his time in Bagghar, the best way to do that was to shout very loudly.

Which is how Captain Haddock found himself spending a night in the drunk tank.


	13. Chapter 13

**Thirteen**

* * *

><p>Tintin didn't find the Captain at the harbour master's office. He didn't find the Captain at any of the pubs along the waterfront and he certainly didn't find the Captain back at their hotel either. The next morning Tintin spent about fifteen minutes knocking at the Captain's bedroom door before going down for breakfast. After breakfast he went back to the Captain's room and spent another fifteen minutes knocking, before finally giving in and accepting that the Captain simply wasn't there.<p>

_So where is he? _Tintin wondered. Bagghar was a large city, and unfamiliar to Tintin. He had no idea where to start looking for the man, and with no other feasible ideas he rang the harbour master's office to check whether or not the Captain had shown up there, but no joy. The man had just… disappeared. Worried, Tintin started phoning around hospitals – in case there had been an accident – before finally phoning the police.

"Captain A. Haddock," said the voice on the other end of the line. "Yes, we had him in last night. He was picked up for being drunk and disorderly."

_Of course he was,_ Tintin thought. "I see," he said aloud. "Is he still there?"

"No, he spent the night in the drunk tank and we let him go. Let me see…" The voice disappeared for a second and Tintin heard the sound of papers rattling and a few computer keys being tapped. "Yes, he was released about fifteen minutes ago."

"Do you know where he went?" Tintin asked hopefully.

"Uh, I think he mentioned something about heading to the harbour master's office. He was banging on about a conspiracy of some kind. T'be honest, we just thought he was a bit, y'know, touched in the head. Sort of simple."

Tintin thanked the man and hung up. It was infuriating: he'd spent the night worrying over the Captain, and the morning searching for him, only to discover that the man had gotten disgracefully drunk – _again! – _and had been arrested! The man was a liability. Tintin quickly hurried to the harbour master's office and tried to decide what he would do. _Go spare? No, there's no point losing my temper. That won't help anything. But I can't have him hanging around me if he's drinking: it's too dangerous. I'll have to send him back to the hotel – he can camp out in the bar there – while I try and find Allan again. _

It was a good plan, he decided: a solid plan. He just had to make sure he didn't hurt the Captain's feelings by excluding him from the investigation.

He was at the docks now. The warehouses were on his left and the waterfront was on his right. There were few ships in port that day, and only one or two cranes working to move cargo to and from the holds. In fact, the docks were almost empty. He checked his watch as he jogged along with Snowy: it was noon. People would either be at prayers or lunch, he supposed. He looked up again, and spied a familiar figure far ahead of him. It was a man wearing a blue jumper and black trousers, striding with a determined gait. It _had_ to be the Captain.

_At last!_

Still jogging, Tintin picked up the pace a little. It was no good shouting: he was still too far away for the Captain to hear him. He kept his eyes on the Captain… and wondered what the hell was going on.

He slowed down for a second as he watched the scene unfolding ahead. Four men had come out of one of the warehouses on the left and had quickly surrounded the Captain. It looked as though… Well, it looked like they were attacking him…

He picked up his pace again, going into a flat-out run when he heard the Captain shouting for help. It _was_ the Captain, but the men had grabbed him and were hitting him a few slaps as they dragged him into the warehouse. _What has he gotten himself into now? _Tintin wondered frantically as he ran.

"Hey!" he shouted. _"Hey! Let go of him!"_ He was close now, so close he could see one man – a very familiar man: he was one of Allan's cronies from the _Karaboudjan_ – looking at him, and he could see the man's mouth moving as he said something. Another man looked over and gave Tintin a nasty grin as he slammed the door to the warehouse closed, and a moment later Tintin hit the thin metal door, twisting to the side and trying to bang it open again with all his might.

It stayed closed.

He struggled with it, trying to ignore the Captain's shouts on the other side as he tried to force the door open again. Precious seconds ticked by. He could vaguely hear the sound of car doors slamming and the Captain's voice being cut off. An engine revved, and the door shot open. The inside of the warehouse was almost empty with just a few crates stacked against the walls in the gloom, but the other door – the door that lead to the busy market street beyond – was open, and Tintin was in time to see a black car pull away from the kerb.

He tore through the warehouse and onto the street beyond. Looking around he spotted a yellow car parked nearby. It went against his morals to steal a car – he didn't download pirated movies either – but it wasn't stealing if he intended to give it back later. That's called 'borrowing'. He hopped into the front seat and hotwired the engine, which burst into life behind him. _It must be one of those cars where the engine's in the back and the trunk's up front, _he thought. He put his foot on the accelerator and –

– the car went backwards.

_What the heck? _

Surprised, he stuck his head out of the window and noticed for the first time that the car was actually attached to a tow-trunk, which had just started to drive off. Rolling his eyes at his own stupidity, he jumped out before the trunk picked up too much speed and took off at a run.

**x**

Snowy liked to run. It was his favourite thing after chicken. He didn't know _why _ he was running, but he did it anyway in case chicken was the end result. Besides, Tintin was running. It was fun to run with Tintin.

**x**

Tintin ran in the direction the black car had gone. He could barely see it, up ahead, but it was nearing an intersection and would soon be gone from sight. He looked around frantically, panic starting to set in, and spied an taxi sitting idly a few meters away. He ran to it, opened the door, and jumped into the back.

"Quick! Follow that car!" he said, at the same time as another voice said; "Central Station, please." He looked around and saw he was sharing the back seat with a small, rather portly, dapper-looking man with a briefcase. The man looked back at him with arrogance borne of the knowledge that young people were second-class citizens compared to the middle-class.

"Excuse me," the man said, "but I believe I was here first."

"I don't think you were," Tintin said irritably.

"Look, _boy,"_ the man said angrily, "I am not in the habit of arguing with children. Get out of my cab! I have to be at the Central Station in fifteen minutes!" As the man spoke, he waved his finger in Tintin's face in a threatening manner.

Snowy, who was sitting on Tintin's lap, stood up and eyed the finger. The hair on the back of his neck started to bristle. To Snowy, people were fine as long as they didn't threaten Tintin. But when they threatened Tintin, they threatened Snowy's supply of chicken.

And Snowy wasn't about to stand for that.

"And I must go to the hospital urgently," Tintin said as he got a good grip on Snowy, "because I've just been bitten by a mad dog!"

Snowy lunged, snapping and barking at the man who dared threaten his supply of chicken and his primary care-giver. Tintin kept his hands firmly around Snowy's chest, allowing the dog to get close enough to the man to scare him, but not close enough to bite him. With a shriek, the man dove out of the taxi and took to his heels.

"Good boy, Snowy! Quick, driver, follow that black car!" Tintin faced forward with a grin, petting Snowy to calm him down, and saw the bemused face of the taxi driver staring back.

"I thought they only said that in the movies," the driver said.

"Quickly!" Tintin urged.

"I'd love to, son, but what black car?"

Frowning, Tintin craned his neck and looked out of the windscreen: the car was long gone.

**x**

He could still hear the taxi driver's laughter as he made his way towards the market. He was fuming: that idiot with the briefcase had really loused things up. God only knew what the crew of the _Karaboudjan _were doing to the Captain, and Tintin had no way of finding them. He'd gone to the police, of course, and the harbour master's office, but they hadn't believed him. The harbour master had patiently explained that the _Karaboudjan _had gone down with all hands, and there was no way he could have seen Allan Thompson or any other crewmate. The policeman behind the desk had listened to his story about seeing a kidnapping and told him to bugger off.

Sometimes, it sucked being fourteen years old. Adults never listened, or asked questions like; "Where's your parents?" and "Shouldn't you be in school?"

Gits.

The only thing he could think of to do was to try and find the alley where he'd lost First Mate Allan. Eventually, someone from the _Karaboudjan _would go there and Tintin would see which house they were visiting. And they could very well be keeping the Captain prisoner there.

But first, he needed a disguise. If they were bold enough to attack the Captain in the middle of the day they would do the same to Tintin too, and he doubted if anyone here in this strange land would care.

So his first order of business was to find a shop selling burnouses. He kept his eyes open as he reached the market and strolled through the stalls. The buildings surrounding the market were shops, but they sold food and clothes to the locals instead of the tourist tat on the majority of the stalls. Up ahead, he saw one with a rack of clothes outside the door. _That'll do, _he thought as he made his way to it.

As he walked, he watched as two men came out of the shop, followed by a hunched, smiling, elderly man who waved them off. There was something familiar about the figures: it was the black trousers that peeked out from the bottom of their burnouses, and the sturdy black shoes that clearly advertised them as policemen.

_The Thompsons! _

"Hey!" he called, immediately putting on a burst of speed to catch them up. At his heels, Snowy lunged at them happily. The Thompsons turned and saw him, their faces instantly melting into relief.

"Thank goodness!" Thompson exclaimed. "We've been searching for you for ages! We didn't think we'd find you alive."

"I'm more concerned that he recognised us straight away - _from behind -_ in spite of our disguises," Thomson said, clearly put-out.

"What happened on the _Karaboudjan?" _Thompson asked, ignoring his colleague. "We got your radio message and jumped on to the next plane to Bagghar International, and here we are: ready to help."

"Did you know the _Karaboudjan _sank?" Thomson asked. "We heard about it on the news when we landed. Are you sure she was carrying heroin?"

"I'm absolutely positive," Tintin assured him. "The drugs are hidden inside tins of crab with the same label as the one that was taken off the drowned man in Belgium."

"Huh," said Thomson thoughtfully. "We saw one of those tins in the shop we were just in."

Tintin had already turned around and was heading for the shop. "Then we should go and check it out," he said firmly.


	14. Chapter 14

**Fourteen**

* * *

><p>The small store was filled with second-hand clothing and smelt faintly of mothballs and mold. One-armed mannequins that had seen better days stood, draped in burqas and burnouses, while clothes-hangers with faded headscarves tied around their middles hung from nails. Everything was slightly shabby and had seen better days. The back of the shop was closed off from the front by way of an old, threadbare rug that had been strung over a long piece of rope. It sagged in the middle like the elastic in a pair of ancient underpants.<p>

The owner of the shop was an elderly, wizened man with a pointed black beard. He wore a patched, blue burnous and a black skull-cap, and looked like something out of old movie, and when he spoke he did nothing to dispel the stereotype.

"I help you, sidi?" he said in a cracked, croaky voice.

"What did you do with the tin of crab?" Thompson asked, pointing at a small end-table that stood in front of the threadbare rug-curtain.

"Uh, I put it away, sidi," the man replied. He was starting to look at them as though they were insane. It was, Tintin reflected, the standard look people used when they were dealing with the Thompsons for the first time.

"Show us," Thomson said imperiously. They had the advantage of confusion. Usually, when presented with such a request, most people would politely tell the requester to go to hell, but the Thompsons were so confusing that it was hard to muster the cognitive ability necessary to deliver such a put-down. The elderly man shuffled behind his curtain, beckoning them to follow him into the living quarters. There was a small counter and a set of cupboards, along with a rickety old table and chairs. Against the far wall, under a shuttered window, was a single bed.

The man shuffled to the cupboards and opened one. Sitting on the top shelf was a distinctive can of crab.

"That's it!" Tintin exclaimed. "That was one of the tins from the _Karaboudjan._ I'm sure of it."

"Open that tin," Thomspon ordered. Still completely confused – and by now wondering if he was taking part in a television show about practical jokes – the elderly man took the tin, shuffled to a drawer set into the counter, retrieved a tin opener and opened the tin. He looked inside, shrugged, and held the tin out to the three strange men.

"That's crab," Thomson said.

"Yes, sidi, finest crab."

Thompson leaned forward and sniffed the contents of the crab experimentally. "Definitely crab," he said.

"Yes, sidi. It is crab," the old man repeated. He started looking around for the hidden cameras, and wondered which of his friends had set him up.

"It _is_ crab," Tintin agreed, "but I saw the same tins on the _Karaboudjan_, and they contained heroin."

"Are you sure?" Thomson asked.

"I know heroin when I see it!" Tintin said. "I've been around it enough to recognise it straight away: you know that. When have I _ever _given you a bad lead?"

"That's true," Thompson said thoughtfully. "You do know your drugs."

"Where did you buy this tin?" Tintin asked the old man.

The old man had realised that it wasn't a practical joke, and that he wasn't going to end up of TV. He was miffed now: he hadn't planned on having crab for dinner today, but now the tin was open it would spoil if he didn't eat it. The sooner he got the crazy people out of his store the better. "From Muhammad Ben Ali, sidi," he said as he shooed them out of his living room and hustled them to the door. He led them out onto the pavement and pointed. "You see shop on corner? I buy from there. Now go: go! You asked him your questions!"

They hurried down to the shop on the corner. It was a small grocery store. Barrels of dried and fresh fruit and vegetables stood out among the crates of herbs and spices, and behind the long counter were shelves packed with canned goods, including three shelves of the distinctive tins of crab. But other than themselves, there didn't seem to be a single other person in the shop. They stood at the counter for a few minutes before the Thompsons became impatient. "Hmm. Nobody about?" Thomson said.

"To be precise, nobody is about," Thompson agreed. There was a doorway, hung with a brightly striped curtain, at the end of the counter. He pulled it back and disappeared from sight. "Hi! Anybody there?" This was followed by an almighty _crash!_ and a yowl of fright and pain. Thomson tore after his colleague.

"Good lord!" he cried. "Something must have happened to hi" –

He didn't finish his sentence. He was cut off by another loud bang and a second shout of pain. Tintin carefully followed them, his hair standing up on the back of his neck. He cautiously pushed the hanging curtain aside, and saw a set of stairs leading down into a cellar almost immediately in front of him. "Are you alright?" he called down.

"Watch the step," Thomson snapped. Looking down, Tintin could see them sitting side by side, rubbing their heads. They had lost their hats in the fall.

"Anything broken?" he asked as they got to their feet and climbed back up the steps.

"No," Thompson said shortly. "All's well."

"Watch your head," Tintin warned. Seconds later, Thomson cracked his head off the opening and swore loudly.

"Er," said a voice. Tintin turned and saw a man in traditional dress peering around the curtain. "Can I help you?" the man asked.

"I'm so sorry," Tintin said with a pleasant smile as he helped Thomson through the opening. "I'm looking for the owner. Or the manager."

"I own this shop," the man replied. The nervous, worried look slipped from his face and was replaced by a beaming smile. "Welcome, welcome! What can I get for you today?"

"Where do you get your tins of crab?" Tintin asked as he followed Muhammad Ben Ali back out to the counter. "Who is your supplier?"

"Ah, it is Omar Ben Salaad, sidi," Muhammad replied. He took a tin down and handed it to Tintin. "Finest crab in all of Bagghar. Freshly caught, sidi."

"Where can I find Omar Ben Salaad?" Tintin asked. From the back room, he could hear the sound of Thompson not-minding-his-head and cracking it off the opening too. He ignored it: this was far more important than making sure the Thompsons didn't hurt themselves.

"You can't miss his house, sidi," Muhammad Ben Ali said with a shrug. "It is the palace outside of town, on the hill. He is the richest man in Bagghar." Tintin listened carefully as Muhammad Ben Ali gave him the directions, jotting them down carefully in his notebook. He thanked the man and waited for the Thompsons to fix their hats before leaving.

"I need you to make enquires about Omar Ben Salaad," he said. "But you must be discrete. I don't know yet what his part in this is, and I don't want to give him a heads-up. I need you to find out, specifically, if he has ever had any business with someone called Allan Thompson; the First Mate of the _Karaboudjan." _

"You can count on us," Thomson said. "We are the soul of discretion. _Mum's the word,_ that's our motto."

"To be precise," Thompson agreed, _"Dumb's the word." _

He left them to it, though he wasn't really all that optimistic. As long as they didn't get too close to Omar Ben Salaad, or simply walk up to him and ask him if he was a drug smuggler, they would be fine. And they'd be occupied enough to let him do some real detective work, and find the Captain. _First things first_, he thought, _I'm going to need a disguise…_

**x**

Thompson and Thomson made their way to the hill outside of town. It really was quite beautiful here, with the winding city spread out below them and the wide expanse of the ocean to the south. The water was blue, and so clear that the small fishing boats looked as though they were floating above it. Ben Salaad's palace wasn't the only one here: there were a handful more spread out across the dusty plain of the hillside – but his was the most handsome. It was built of white stone and shone like a jewel.

It was surrounded by a high wall, and the front gate was guarded by two men who looked like they were part of a private security firm. They were certainly armed like a private army. The Thomspons approached the guards as they did anyone: with the certainty that everyone wanted to help the police with their enquiries. "Excuse me," Thomson called, "but I wonder if this is the home of Omar Ben Salaad?"

"Yes, sidi," one of the guards said. The two men looked the Thompsons up and down curiously. "Can I help you?"

"Yes. We would like to speak with Mr Salaad."

"I'm afraid that's not possible," the guard replied. "He has gone to mosque. He goes every day at this time: my master is a devout man and lives by Allah's laws."

"Ah-ha! A religious man! Good, good."

"You must have just passed him," the other guard added. "He was on his horse. He will have reached the town by now though."

They did remember seeing a portly, moon-faced man sitting on a high-stepping horse. They only really noticed it because of the look of annoyance on the horse's expressive face and the fact that there had been a man with a big stick walking in front of the horse, clearing the way.

"I say, Thompson," Thomson said as they walked briskly back towards the town, "I thought that charity was one of the five pillars of Islam."

"Why, it is, my dear friend. It is. What makes you ask?"

"Well, it wasn't very charitable of Mr Salaad to tell his servant to beat that old fellow who stepped out in front of him, was it?"

"No, it wasn't, but you must remember: religious men are usually bastards."

**x**

They found the mosque soon enough, and were kicked out even sooner: Islam was against shoes, apparently.

**x**

In one of the narrow, winding streets on the eastern side of the city, a young blind man sat cross-legged against a wall, his white stick across his knees. The hood of his burnous was pulled up until it almost covered his face. The only thing visible was the glint of his dark glasses. Allan Thompson didn't see the blind man. He was too busy to take notice of his surroundings. He'd just received a phone call telling him that somehow that drunken idiot Haddock had managed to catch up to them and was here, in Bagghar. There was no way – _no way – _that Haddock was smart enough or brave enough to come after them. That meant only one thing: Tintin had followed them and was on their trail.

Allan had done a little reading since they'd arrived in Bagghar. Oh yes: he'd found an internet café and read up on Tintin, and from what he'd read Tintin was Bad News; capital 'B', capital 'N'. If they wanted to stay out of jail – and Allan _really_ wanted to stay out of jail – they would have to find Tintin quickly and kill him. All they had to do was get the Captain to tell them where Tintin was hiding. Then they could grab the kid and bring him back to the _Karabou_ – sorry, sorry: the _Djebel Amilah_ – and kill him there. It would be easier to clean up, and they could just toss his dead ass overboard in international wa-_argh!_

His foot snagged against something and he pitched forward. He landed, stretched out on the pavement with grit stinging his cheek and his skinned hands. Oblivious, he didn't see the blind man slip away quickly, or the small white dog that ran after the mysterious figure. When he looked around, there was nothing: the alleyway was clear. _Bloody paving stones,_ he thought to himself. _This place is such a dump. Christ, I can't wait to get back to Europe, where there's actual roads and proper sidewalks. Fuck it: I'm here anyway._

He picked himself up and, ignoring the small welts of blood that pricked up from the palms of his hands, limped into the waiting house.

**x**

Unbeknownst to Allan, Tintin peeked around the corner and took note of the house the sailor had entered. He was torn: this was the same place that he'd lost Allan the last time, so that house probably _was _the headquarters for the Bagghar side of the operation. That meant that the Captain was probably in there somewhere. On the other hand, if he went in now Allan might recognise him and the game would be up. He didn't for one second think that Allan would simply shake his hand and give himself up to the police.

He took a deep breath and adjusted his burnous so that his face was hidden in the shadow of the cowl. He only had one chance to pull this off. He would make a brief foray in to spy out the lay of the land. The sooner he knew what he was facing – and how many men he was facing – the better.

Sweeping his white stick back and forth, he wandered towards the house. He looked around casually, but the street was clear. Cautiously, he opened the door and followed Allan inside.

It opened up into what appeared to be a huge kitchen. Great barrels of dates and spices stood stacked around the room. At the far end of the room, a man was leaning over a counter, preparing what appeared to be a large joint of beef. The man looked up and eyed the blind beggar irritably. "What do you want?" he snapped.

"Alms," Tintin said, his voice weak. "Alms, for the love of the Prophet. Allah will reward you."

"Piss off, you verminous little sod! Filthy beggars. Go and get a proper job!"

**x**

Snowy wandered into the building after Tintin. The was something in here that smelt nice. No, it smelt _great_. Once again, Nose had done him proud. And there it was. Sitting on the counter. A heavenly light surrounded it and flights of angels beckoned him to it. It wasn't chicken, but it would do.

Tintin was saying something. A tall man said something else. The tall man was angry, but he also had the nice thing. Tintin left. For a second, Snowy was torn between following his master or eating the nice thing, but in the end he decided to have a punt on the food. After all, Nose was on a roll: it could find Tintin later. The tall man hadn't seen him. Snowy waited some more, licking his lips as the tantalising smell teased him. The tall man turned away. He was still muttering something under his breath.

Snowy struck.

**x**

_What a polite man,_ Tintin thought as he turned around and cleared out. Well, there was only one man on guard, it seemed, but as long as he was there Tintin couldn't do anything. Unless, of course, he stormed the room and took the man by surprise. But what were the chances of that working out? More likely, there were more men hidden somewhere about the building, and as soon as their fellow shouted for help they'd pour out and the game would be up. No, he had to think carefully about this. Any misstep now could be life-threatening for the Captain, and Tintin certainly didn't want –

"_You little runt! Get back here!" _

Tintin jumped at the shout and got ready to run in case it was directed at him, but when he turned around Snowy was hurtling along the street, his legs pumping furiously and his head held high, with the joint of beef in his mouth. _Good for you, Snowy!_ Tintin thought. He was actually quite impressed by the dog: it was a very large joint for such a small creature to steal, but Snowy was nothing if not tenacious.

He watched as the guard tore after the dog, waving a big stick. He wasn't worried about Snowy getting caught: when it came to stealing food Snowy was never caught. Tintin recalled one memorable occasion where Snowy had stolen a full roast chicken from the dining cart of a train, and another time when he'd eaten his way _into _a box of Markies. He'd been crapping for days after that last one.

Well, the way was clear! It was now or never. He quickly ducked back into the building and set about searching for the Captain.

The first set of stairs led to a long room with a couple of mattresses spread along the floor. At the end of it was a small bathroom with a filthy shower and toilet that was overflowing with brown water. Wrinkling his nose, Tintin hurried back downstairs. There had to be something else: Allan didn't disappear into thin air and Tintin doubted the toilet led to the Ministry of Magic. The only other option was the stairs down to the cellar.

Suddenly, he heard a familiar voice: the man who had shooed him from the room was returning, and he was grumbling to someone else. "A whole joint," he was saying. "Vile beast. If I catch it I'll kill it."

His companion laughed. "You take things too seriously! Let the dog go: he bested you, that's all. Is sidi Allan here yet?"

Tintin looked around, but there was no hiding place and the men were almost outside the door. With no other option, he hurried down to the cellar in the nick of time.

"Yes, he's just arrived, Abd El Drachm. You will find him downstairs."

_Downstairs? _Tintin thought. _Crap!_ He looked around. There were huge barrels down here, lying on their sides and already tapped, but he couldn't see any decent hiding place and God knew what they'd do to him if he was caught down here. In desperation, he stuffed himself into the small gap between the closest barrel and the wall and hoped to God that nobody saw him.


	15. Chapter 15

**Warning:** This chapter contains sea-worthy language from everyone's favourite Captain. Remember: he's only just started moderating his language so it's fairly believable that he'd lapse back into swearing under times of extreme stress.

* * *

><p><strong>Fifteen<strong>

* * *

><p>Hidden in a small gap between a large barrel of wine and the wall of the cellar, Tintin held his breath as an Arabian man walked by. The man looked slightly distracted, his arms folded into the sleeves of his burnous. He passed from sight and Tintin waited for something – anything. But nothing happened. There was a very slight creaking noise, then… Nothing. No sound at all, and the cellar settled back into silence. He could barely hear the sound of someone moving around upstairs, but those noises were remote. Cautiously, he peeked out, ready to pull back if he was seen, but there was nobody to see him.<p>

The cellar was empty.

He pulled himself out and looked around, ready to bolt back to his hiding place, but there was nothing to run from. There were four huge barrels – easily big enough for him to stand in without stooping over – and nothing else. Even the windows, which were high up on the walls, were tiny – barely big enough to let air into the underground room; more vents than windows. They certainly weren't big enough for a full-grown man to squeeze through. Tintin doubted if even _he_ could squeeze through one, and he wasn't the tallest person in the world.

It made no sense: the man couldn't have disappeared into thin air. _So where on earth is he? _he thought to himself. The end of the cellar was a bare wall, but Tintin tapped along it quietly and experimentally, waiting to see if there was a hollow portion behind it. But from what he could tell it was solid stone. His fist made a dull, solid _thunk_ as it hit the wall. There was no secret passage there.

He stood for a moment, wondering what on earth was going on, when a sudden, loud, explosion of noise, that sounded like the distorted bark of a large dog, made him jump. Startled, he looked around, and spied Snowy in one of the windows, staring down at his master and licking his chops. "Snowy!" Tintin hissed. "You frightened the life out of me! What are you doing up there?"

Snowy wagged his tail and padded his front feet impatiently, eager to rejoin his master. "Is that where you hid?" Tintin chided him as he reached up. Snowy jumped forward and landed in Tintin's arms. He licked at Tintin's chin, and the teenager could smell beef on the dog's wet breath. "Did you eat that whole thing?" Tintin asked, impressed. "Good boy! Maybe you can help me, hm?" he said as he put the dog onto the ground. "I feel like Diogenes, seeking a man…"

Tintin trailed into thought as he watched Snowy snuffling around the base of one of the huge barrels. _The thing about Diogenes,_ Tintin thought. _That is: the _very _important thing, was that he lived in a barrel… _

_Of course!_ Oh, it was so simple, now that he thought about it. One of the barrels was a fake: a hidden door to fool any casual visitor to the building. The whole place seemed to be some sort of catering outfit – aside from the strange dormitory upstairs – and probably supplied a few of the tourist pubs in the area, cooking food that the halal caterers wouldn't touch. If someone came to put in an order, all they'd see was the huge vats of wine, never thinking that one was a doorway to a secret room.

And thanks to Snowy's nose, he had an idea which one it was.

Getting down on his hunkers, he felt around the barrel until he found a small hinge. _Well, I'm on the right track, that's for sure, _he thought. On the other side of the barrel, almost opposite the hinge, was a tiny, circular button in the wood. He pressed it gently and the whole front of the vat swung open, revealing a short, barrel-shaped tunnel. At the far end was a wooden door, which had been left open.

With Snowy at his heels, Tintin closed the secret door behind him and crept through the wooden tunnel and into the stone corridor beyond. It was amazing: it appeared to be a vast, underground network of tunnels. Just ahead of him was a stone arch cut into the wall, and a set of stone steps leading further down into the earth. He went down them as quietly as possible, his soft-soled running shoes making little noise on the hard stone.

He came out in another corridor, which opened up into a long, square-shaped room. Stacks of crates, the lids already prised open as though the contents had been carefully examined, stood around the room, and Tintin could see the distinctive red and yellow labels of the tins of crab. These crates, however, bore the shipping stamp of the _Karaboudjan_ on the side.

"Aha!" he said as he picked up one of the tins. "The heroin! Oh, I've never been so pleased to see drugs in my life!" A load roar made him look up.

The word; _"Bandit!" _floated to him on the quiet air. It was faint and distant, but it was unmistakable. "That's the Captain's voice," Tintin said.

**x**

The last time Captain Haddock had been tied up and whipped, it had involved a woman and had been slightly more pleasurable than this. Only slightly, mind: he wasn't a fan of pain in the bedroom, especially when it was concentrated on his arse cheeks. That had been a strange night though, and he could chalk that up to the curiosity of youth. _This,_ on the other hand, could only be chalked up to the cruelty of man.

He heard the leather belt as it whistled through the air, and braced himself before it slapped down hard on his broad shoulders. He was on his knees – never a good position for a man to find himself in, unless he were _that_ way inclined – with his hands tied to a thick metal ring that was set into the concrete floor beneath him. He looked over his shoulder and eyed the tall, brute of a bloke that held the belt.

"I'll get you," he promised. "I'll fucking get you. You see if I don't." He vaguely recognised the man: he was one of the new crew that Allan had took on about six months ago. _How the hell did it take me so long to cotton on to Allan? How the hell didn't I see what he's really like until now?_

"Smart mouth," the man said. He quickly brought the belt down again, this time aiming for a different spot on the lower part of the Captain's back.

"Argh! You _cunt_, you!"

"I thought you'd given up swearing," Allan said with a mocking smile.

"And I thought you'd given up being a dickhead," the Captain shot back, "but it turns out we were both wrong." Allan nodded at the man with the belt, and the Captain felt another blossom of hard pain, this time just below his shoulder-blades. He gritted his teeth to stop himself from crying out again.

"I'm gonna ask you again," Allan drawled lazily. "And this is gonna be the last time I ask you: where's Tintin?"

"Thundering typhoons, I don't _know!"_ the Captain shouted. "And even if I did, do you honestly think I'd give him up to a bunch of blistering cockbags like you?"

"Well look at you," Allan said with mock wonder. "Getting all noble in your last few minutes on earth."

"Yeah? Is this my last few minutes on earth?" the Captain demanded. "Then I might as well tell you: you're not fooling anyone with the John Wayne act. You're nothing like the Duke. And besides, he were a right _pussy_ compared Clint Eastwood. You twat!"

Allan's face twisted into a scowl. "You'll regret that," he said furiously. He bent down and put his face inches away from the Captain's. "Where," he shouted, "is Tintin?"

A red and yellow blur flew across the room and smacked him hard on the side of his face. "Here!" Tintin called. He had entered the room silently and drawn his gun – the same one he'd stolen from the _Karaboudjan: _Allan would no doubt be pleased to know that they'd finally found Pedro's gun – and had it pointed at Allan. "Put your hands up," he said. This time, the gun was firm in his hand. "You, put down the belt and untie the Captain."

The large man tossed the belt aside and quickly freed the Captain. "Cheers, pal," the Captain said as he stood up straight. He fixed his jumper and eyed the bag man. He was tall, but the Captain had a hard head. He seized the man by the front of his shirt and dragged his head down. At the same time, the Captain forced his head up into a vicious jab, and nutted the tall man in the face. The man went down with a scream as his nose broke. "Told you I'd get you," the Captain said smugly. "Tintin!" He turned to the teenager and threw his hands in the air. "Good lad!" He rushed forward and grabbed Tintin in a bear hug, swinging him off his feet and knocking the gun from his hand.

"_No! Captain! I – _oh, for crying out loud!" Tintin lunged for the gun but Tom, the man who had assaulted him on the _Karaboudjan _and put him in the hold, got there first. The man dove forward and seized the gun, rolling until he was facing towards Tintin and the Captain, the gun pointed at them.

"_Run!"_ Tintin grabbed the Captain's hand and pulled him back the way he'd come. There was a room off the corridor that they could hide in. They could barricade the doors and wait it out until Thompson and Thomson came looking for them.

They hurtled down the corridor and Tintin shoved the Captain into the room. "Find something to put against the door," he shouted breathlessly.

"What door?" the Captain cried.

"Ah, damn it!" There was no door. Tintin looked around desperately. He could hear the sound of running footsteps close by: they were caught. Against the back of the small room was a tall stack of what appeared to be dried grass or hay. It had been baled and put into large cubes that were tied together with thick twine. On the wall closest to them were shelves upon shelves of wine bottles. "Aha!" he cried. He grabbed a bottle by the neck and waited until someone appeared.

Tom was the first. He turned the corner and stood, framed against the doorway. "Got you!" he said. Tintin throw the bottle _hard. _It hit Tom's face and smashed. He fell back, screaming and clutching his face as blood trickled through his fingers. As his gun dropped it fired itself, the bullet whizzing past Tintin's face with barely an inch to spare. It buried itself in the hay behind the Captain and Tintin. Still white hot from being fired, it met the dry grass and started to smoulder. Thin tendrils of white smoke began to curl up from it.

"More bottles!" Tintin shouted, not noticing where the bullet had stopped. Allan had just appeared.

"Take that!" the Captain roared, throwing a bottle at Allan with all his might. It barely missed the First Mate, and shattered on the wall behind him.

"Get back!" Allan shouted. "Everyone back!" They dodged out of the way, dragging the injured Tom after them.

"Hurray!" Tintin cried. "That's got them on the run!"

"Well done, lad!" The Captain clapped him on the shoulder. "That was quick thinking! What do we do now though? They're just waiting around the corner for us, aren't they?"

"Yes, they are," Tintin replied. He chewed his bottom lip thoughtfully. "How long can we hold them off for?"

"There's a good few bottles here," the Captain said. "About two hundred. We going to smash 'em all?"

"If we have to," Tintin said firmly. "Don't drink any of them, Captain!"

"If we're going to die, we might as well die happy…"

"I'm warning you!" Tintin stopped and sniffed. "What's that smell?" He looked around for Snowy, wondering what the dog had found now, and saw the cloud of white smoke from the burning bale. Snowy was sitting in front of it in a haze of smoke, his eyes half closed and his ears back. Far from looking worried or frightened, the dog looked remarkably peaceful, as though he was about to go to sleep. "Oh dear," said Tintin.

"What's 'oh dear'?" the Captain asked absently as he examined one of the bottles of wine. "Hmm. A rare vintage. This must have cost a pretty penny."

"Um," said Tintin. A huge grin spread over his face and he started to laugh. He couldn't help it. He looked over at the Captain, giggling helplessly. The Captain looked back at him, bewildered. But once Tintin had started laughing, the Captain found himself joining in.

"What?" he asked through chuckles. "What's so funny?"

"Don't get mad," Tintin said.

"I don't feel mad," the Captain replied. "In fact, I feel brilliant. Really calm, actually. I don't know why: there's men with guns out there waiting to kill us, and I feel grand!"

"Because we're high!" Tintin giggled. He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder at the smoke bales. "That's marijuana! It's on fire! This whole room is a big hot-box, and we're getting high off fumes!"

"A-ha ha! You're kidding!"

"No! We're stoned off our asses!"

"Ha ha! Brilliant! I always wanted to try weed before I died!"

**x**

Fifteen minutes passed. Out in the corridor, Allan looked around. One of his men had a broken nose and was still pumping blood, and Tom had a deep gash in his cheek courtesy of Tintin and that first bottle of wine. They listened to the giggling in silence. "That's unbelievable," he said quietly. "They're high or drunk, or something. I think we can just go in and get them."

"Dure shure?" the man with the broken nose said thickly.

"Yeah. Pretty sure."

"You go first," Tom said, still fuming and holding his hand to his cut face.

"Ok," Allan said with a shrug. He cautiously turned the corner and looked into the room. Against all rational judgement, Tintin was sitting on the steps with his back to the open doorway. He took a long slug from a bottle of wine and passed it back to the Captain, who was sitting cross-legged in front of him.

"Ok," Tintin said as the Captain took a deep drink. "Ok. Right. But, see, what if school can't teach you anything? Theoretically. No, wait: mythologically. Hang on, that's wrong. What word am I looking for?"

"God knows," the Captain replied. "But school can teach anyone stuff. It's what it's there for."

"Yeah, but, like, what if, right, what if you don't _like_ school, 'cos the teachers aren't that nice, yeah? Like, what if they're _really_ horrible to you?"

"That doesn't matter!" The Captain swayed drunkenly. "Nobody likes school, and teachers are all thundering arseholes! Where are the parents, eh? That's what I want to know. Where are the parents when all these kids are running away?"

"Hypothetically," Tintin said suddenly. "That's the word I'm looking for: hypothetically. But what if you don't have parents, Captain? What if there's nobody and you live in a horrible orphanage run by priests and really horrible people that treat you like crap?"

"It doesn't matter!" The Captain wagged his finger in the air self-righteously. "There's ways and means to sort that out. You don't go… _Running away._ You don't solve anything by _running away._ And a fourteen year old shouldn't be running half-way across the world. That's dangerous, that is."

Allan looked back at his men and shrugged. "They're pretty drunk," he offered. "I'll grab Tintin. You two get the Captain."

"What would you do?" Tintin asked. He closed one eye and peered at the Captain. "What would you do if you found one of these mythological, hypothetical kids? And they're fifteen, not fourteen."

"Fifteen, fourteen: it's still against the law," the Captain replied. "I'd report them."

"Report them?" Tintin scoffed.

"Of course! Kids that age can't go running off! They need to be at home. Or in an 'ome. Orphanage. Whatever. Oh, 'ello Mate." He waved absently at Allan.

"Captain," Allan replied politely. He bent down and slid his arm under Tintin's arms, around his chest, and pulled him up.

"Oh!" said Tintin in surprise. He looked up at Allan and grinned. "Oh, it's you."

"Yep, it's me," Allan agreed. "Why don't we get you some air, hmm?"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Lots of swearing here. I don't consider it out of character though: in a fandom where the Captain is sleeping with Tintin at every turn, a bit of swearing from a sailor isn't the worst thing. I know the C Word is considered to be fairly unusable in some countries, but it's very common in Britain and Ireland so I have no problem imagining the Captain saying it.

Also, I had to replace the wine fumes with marijuana. I'm highly doubtful that a hardened alcoholic could get drunk off 'fumes' from a few broken bottles of wine. I once smashed a case of wine when I was working in a shop, and I didn't get drunk. I got a mop :( It wasn't fun.


	16. Chapter 16

**Sixteen**

* * *

><p>Fresh air sounded like a good idea, Tintin decided. His head was fuzzy and he wasn't thinking clearly. He also had a severe case of the hiccups which were getting steadily worse. Every time he hiccupped he ended up giggling until he was so breathless all he could do was hiccup and slowly suffocate from giggling. He staggered away from Allan and braced himself against the wall, trying to stop his giggles and his hiccups.<p>

"Hey!" Allan warned, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him back.

"Naaa-_hic!-_ha! Hahaha-_hic!-_Oh cra-_hic!-_hap! Haha-_hic!"_

"God-damn, I hate stoners," Allan muttered under his breath. Behind them, the Captain had started shouting.

"_You bully! You stole my bottle! Renegade! Pox-bottler! Shite-hawke!"_

"I swear to God, I'm just looking for a reason to punch him!" Allan shouted. "What the hell is the hold-up back there?"

"He's freaking out," Tom called back. "You know what he's like."

"Always spoiling for a fight." Allan let go of Tintin – the kid wasn't capable of doing anything for a while – and went back to the wine cellar. "I'll give him a God-damned fight," he promised.

Tintin sagged against the wall. He was a bit tired now. He could probably sleep for a bit. Even Snowy was relaxed: he was sitting down, leaning against Tintin's leg with his tail wagging slowly. Still hiccupping, Tintin watched as Allan turned the corner and disappeared into the wine cellar.

"_Buccaneer! Vegetarian! Politician!"_

"_Be quiet, you drunken fool!"_

There was an almighty row – the sounds of punching and fists meeting flesh; dull thuds and grunts and swearing. And over it all, Captain Haddock's voice rose like a foghorn.

"_Pirate! Corsair! Hydrocarbon! Harlequin! Bastard! Gyroscope!" _

Tintin slipped a little further down the wall and started to giggle again. It was unusual, but he had to admit that the Captain's new-found way of swearing was very effective. He may just have be saying random words, but he was hurling them with such accuracy and venom that they automatically became insults.

Allan came flying out of the wine cellar. He could have tripped over the steps in his haste to get away or he could have been thrown bodily: either way he was seriously beaten up. He had a split lip, a black eye, bruises on his right cheek that were already starting to turn dark and his jacket was ripped badly. He landed in such a forlorn heap that Tintin couldn't help uttering a short burst of surprised laughter.

"What happened to you?" he exclaimed, dumbfounded. He hadn't thought that the Captain was quite as strong as that. Allan groaned and lay still, but the question was answered a few seconds later when the man who had been beating the Captain with a leather belt tore out of the room, tread water in his haste to turn the corner, and zoomed past Tintin. The Captain, clutching a bottle of wine like a club, followed him, still shouting his bizarre swearwords.

"_Anthracite! Fuzzy-wuzzy! Coconut! Snaffler! Rumbeak!" _

He chased after the burly crewman, all the while looking like a Rottweiler that was chewing a wasp. "Get 'im!" Tintin shouted. "Seek him out, boy!"

Hearing the word 'seek', Snowy started to get excited too. People were running, and he wanted to know why, but the word 'seek' was a command word used by Tintin whenever he had hidden Snowy's favourite Squeaky Ball. Automatically assuming that the running men were connected to Squeaky Ball – which must be hidden nearby: _quod erat demonstrandum_ – and that Tintin wanted to play, Snowy started to look for it. Nose to the ground and whipped into a frenzy of small-dog excitement, Snowy chased after the Captain while Tintin brought up the rear.

**x**

The inside of Omar ben Salaad's study was elegant and stylish. The furniture was simple yet luxurious and the rest of the fittings spoke of wealth and good taste. The wall behind Salaad's chair – which had a higher seat than the sofa the Thompsons were sitting on – was taken up by a long, expansive bookshelf filled with leather-bound first editions and rare folios. ben Salaad smiled down at them from his elevated position, like a plump, benevolent king.

He wasn't entirely sure why these strange men were in his house. They had been let in after ben Salaad had returned from the mosque and they were so sure that he would want to help them with their enquiries that he'd felt like he couldn't refuse them. They were mildly confusing, but seemed harmless enough.

The Thompsons were in a quandary. They had promised Tintin they wouldn't say anything directly to Omar ben Salaad about the drug smuggling operation, and they were men of their word. So how were they to make discrete enquiries of him?

"How can I help you, gentlemen?" ben Salaad aksed politely.

"Hmm," said Thomson. "The thing is… We've been asked to carry out an investigation" –

"A discrete investigation," Thompson added.

"Aah." ben Salaad nodded knowingly. "And what, may I ask, is the subject of your investigation?"

"A journalist has been investigating an international drug cartel and believes it leads back to you."

ben Salaad's jaw dropped.

"I don't think you were supposed to say that, Thomson."

"Dumb's the word, Thompson."

"To be precise" –

Omar ben Salaad stood up and drew himself up to his full height indignantly. "By Allah!" he roared. "How dare you come into my house and insult me in such a manner!"

"Blimey! He looks annoyed, Thompson!"

"Who dares level such accusations at the mighty Omar ben Salaad? Get out, infidel dogs! Out, or I'll have you flogged to death!"

"It's a good job we're so sure that Islam is a peaceful religion, Thomson."

They weren't _quite_ sure what happened after that: the room seemed to turn into a Benny Hill sketch for a second. A part of the large bookcase swung open, cracking Omar ben Salaad in the back of the head. A frightened, olive-skinned man with a broken nose and dishevelled, wine-stained clothing ran out of a dark passage behind the bookcase. He was gibbering and being chased by a tall man in a blue jumper, who was brandishing a bottle of wine in a threatening manner while shouting the strangest insults the Thompsons had ever heard (_"Nincompoop! Anacoluthon! Muckluck! Liquorice!") _who in turn was followed by a giggling, hiccupping Tintin.

"Seek!" Tintin was shouting. "Seek! Seek!" Snowy barked excitedly at his heels.

"Tintin!" Thomson exclaimed.

"Hey, homeboys!" Tintin replied, staggering to a halt. "What up?"

"So _you're _Tintin," ben Salaad spat. He pulled a gun from a holster hidden inside his burnous and waved it at Tintin. "You've been a real thorn in my balls, boy."

"Calm down, homie," Tintin said with a laugh. "Guns are crazy dangerous, you know? In the words of Father Dougal McGuire: careful now! Haha-_hic!-_ha!"

Snowy was frustrated. He _really _wanted Squeaky Ball now but he still couldn't find the wretched thing. It made no sense: why would Tintin say it was hidden if it wasn't? Who would do that? What sort of monster could build up a dog's hopes like that, only to crush them?

_The sort of monster that pretends to throw the ball when he really hasn't, _a treacherous inner voice replied.

It was too much to bear. A lesser dog would have snapped by now. And here was a man-with-a-hood-covering-his-face threatening Tintin? On top of everything else? No, no, señor: this cheese is no good.

Snowy launched himself at Omar ben Salaad, his front paws wrapping around the short man's leg as he sunk his teeth in to the chubby arse that was now at mouth level. ben Salaad howled in pain and flailed wildly, and somehow the gun managed to go off, blasting a hole in the ceiling. The elegant, weighty light fixture dropped like a stone in a shower of plaster and splinters, and landed squarely on ben Salaad's head with a heavy _Thunk! _while a large piece of plaster landed on Tintin's. ben Salaad went down like a ton of bricks, almost crushing Snowy. Tintin, on the other hand, started to sober up as a fresh rush of adrenaline overcame the last effects of the weed.

"Who is this man?" he asked when the dust had settled.

"That's Omar ben Salaad," Thompson explained. "We were in the middle of questioning him. He swears he's innocent."

"He can't be innocent," Tintin scoffed. "He's got a cellar full of drugs. The heroin from the _Karaboudjan _is down there, along with a load of marijuana. Besides," he added thoughtfully, kneeling down beside the unconscious man. Something had caught his eye. "Besides, look at this necklace." He gently lifted the delicate gold chain out of the folds of ben Salaad's burnous to show the detectives the pendant that hung there: two distinctive golden crab claws similar to the design on the fake tins of crab meat. "He's the ringleader," Tintin continued. "I'm sure of it. We must call the police at once."

"_We're_ the police," Thompson pointed out irritably.

"Oh, you have a warrant to search down there?" Tintin asked politely.

"Call the police, Thomson."

**x**

Captain Haddock had his prey in his sights. He was bearing down fast on the man. He wasn't even sure why he was chasing him any more, but something inside said; _'_Chase_ him!'_ and he was complying. This was the usual state of the drunken brawler, and the Captain was nothing if not a drunken brawler. From the very first night that he and his friend, Jimmy, had robbed that naggin of vodka from Jimmy's older sister when they were fifteen, Archibald Haddock had been a born-again drunken brawler.

Besides, he figured, this guy was quite dangerous. This guy was involved with Allan – treacherous dog – and had hit the Captain with a belt.

_That's why I'm chasing him! _his brain reminded him. _Hurray for me!_

The streets whipped by: curious and confused spectators stood back out of the way to let the two men pass. From the corner of his eye, the Captain registered something familiar: the flash of a uniform.

_Thank God! This is a genuinely new emotion: being pleased to see the police._

"Hey," he said, slowing down and pointing at his quarry. "Arrest that man! He's a bully and he's from the _Karabou" –_

Which is how Captain Haddock ended up in unconscious in an alleyway, after being coshed with a copper's billy-club.

**x**

The police arrived at Omar ben Salaad's house shortly after that to find ben Salaad still unconscious. They looked at the eminent, wealthy man that practically owned the city and the three strangers that were responsible.

"What happened here?" the sergeant asked, slightly shell-shocked and more than a bit confused.

"He shot the ceiling and managed to knock himself out," Tintin said quickly. He pointed to the gun, which lay on the floor just out of ben Salaad's reach.

"We have brought him to justice," Thomson said imperiously.

"To be precise," Thompson added, "we have flouted him with buttkiss."

"There are more in the cellar," Tintin said, extracting himself from his burnous. "Some of them are armed but I think they're knocked out."

They rushed down the passage and followed Tintin as he led them back to where he'd left Allan unconscious on the ground. While Tom was still in the wine cellar, groaning and holding his injured head, Allan was gone. "He's the most dangerous," Tintin said grimly. "There's another way out: he must have gone that way."

"Right." On a more even footing, the sergeant took over. "Men, you stay here and arrest everyone that's left, including ben Salaad. I don't care how much money he offers you to let him go, or what he threatens you with: if he's not here when I get back, I'll have your badges. Detectives," he turned to the Thompsons, "you're with me."

Once again Tintin took the lead, bringing them through the stone passages to the door that opened at the end of the fake wine barrel. The kitchen was deserted by now and the streets beyond were starting to empty out as the day wore on. It was early evening, and the cooler air was some respite from the heat of the small passages underground.

They caught sight of Allan when they were scouting through the market. He was striding with some determination towards the harbour, looking cagily over his shoulder every so often to make sure he wasn't being followed. When he reached the docks and disappeared from sight, Tintin put on a burst of speed to try and catch up with him, but by the time he'd reached the harbour there was no sign of Allan.

There was, on the other hand, a small commotion along the wharf. A tall, thin sailor was shouting, and the small crowd of people around him looked annoyed. They were all staring out to sea. As soon as the sailor saw the police uniforms, he hailed them. He was, Tintin judged by his accent, Polish.

"Someone stole one of the motorboats!" the sailor said indignantly. "I rent boats," he continued. "I rent boats and this man, he come and take! Is crazy! He just take my boat!"

Tintin squinted out at the motorboat that was rapidly zooming away from the harbour. "It's him!" he declared. "We need to go after him! Do you have another boat?" Without waiting for a definite response, he simply hopped into another motorboat and took the helm. Thomson and Thompson followed him, leaving the sergeant to distract the poor sailor who was quickly seeing two of his best boats stolen from under his very eyes.

Tintin started the engine and the boat roared into life. He kept the acceleration lever pushed forward, leaning forward in anticipation of the speed that would follow, but nothing happened. He waited for a second before pointing out the obvious. "Er, we're not moving."

"Painter!" he heard a voice call out. "You slip painter first! Rope! Rope!"

"I'll get it," Thomson said. He and Thompson clustered together, trying to untie the rope that anchored the boat to the dock.

"Take my knife," Thompson offered. "It'll be quicker."

Thomson quickly cut through the rope, and the boat shot off. Sadly, due to a combination of gravity, and force versus acceleration, the Thompsons stayed where they were, albeit about a foot lower than they had been, and became significantly wetter.

Tintin didn't look back so he didn't notice that the Thomspons were no longer with him. "Wow! This boat is _fast! _We're really gaining on him, huh? We're overhauling him quickly."

He closed the gap rapidly, the boat bouncing merrily as it skimmed the calm waters of the harbour. It actually wasn't that hard to drive a motorboat, he decided. He just needed to figure out where the brakes were, but that would come later. Besides, it couldn't be as disastrous as trying to land a plane in the middle of a storm and without any fuel.

The boats were almost level by now. Allan turned and Tintin noticed that the man had a gun. He leaned down, using the dash as cover, as Allan loosed off a few shots. "Take the wheel!" Tintin cried when Allan was finished. He prepared to jump into Allan's boat, and noticed for the first time that he was alone. Snowy looked up at him politely, wagging his tail.

_Well, this makes things a bit more difficult._

He had planned to simply leap into Allan's boat, but if he did that now Snowy would probably end up half-way out to sea before anyone could catch up to him. _Right. What can I do? _There was a fishing net in the back of the boat. Tintin seized it and flung it over Allan as hard as he could, knowing that the laws of narrative meant that any villain would be rendered quite helpless when introduced to even the smallest bit of netting. Quickly grabbing Snowy and tucking the dog under his arm, he leaped into Allan's boat as the man fought with the fishing net, and delivered a sound punch to the face.

**x**

The sergeant and the Thompsons waited, watching one boat rock wildly as the other shot off to sea. "My boat!" someone said plaintively. "He lose my boat!"

"Someone's getting up," the sergeant said urgently. "I think it's over." He cupped his hands around his eyes and squinted. "It's… Yes! It's Tintin! He's got the boat under control. He's coming back."

"Hooray!" the Captain shouted. He'd woken up a few minutes ago and staggered to the harbour. Now, he was sitting on a bollard, unnoticed, beside the sergeant. He punched the air in triumph, and managed to punch the sergeant on the chin.

"Right," said the policeman, whipping out his billy-club. "That's it!" He raised the club, but Thompson grabbed his arm.

"Hey now! None of that. You're a policeman, not a thug. And besides: that's Captain Haddock. It's thanks to him you've got the chance to arrest the crew of the _Karaboudjan_ and break this drug cartel open."

"_How do I stop!" _Tintin cried as the boat roared closer.

"Pull the red lever!" the Captain shouted back. "The red one! _The flaming red one! _Oh, crikey! Everyone get back!"

It wasn't a crash. Not… _exactly. _More of a bump that helped the boat stop _("My boat! My precious boat! He lose one, he ruin this one!"), _but it did the trick. Grinning, Tintin hopped out and dashed over to the Captain. "We did it!" he cried.

"Damn right we did!" They high-fived before they could stop themselves.

"Who are those people?" Tintin, still grinning happily, pointed behind the Captain. A small group of policemen were coming towards them with a slender Asian man in their midst.

"No clue," the Captain said.

"My heartiest congratulations," the Asian man said as he reached them. He bowed politely and held his hand out to Tintin, who took it unthinkingly. "My name is Bunji Kuraki. I am part of a special squad from the Yokohama police force. The police have just freed me from the hold of the _Karaboudjan_, where I was being held prisoner."

"Jesus Christ!" the Captain exclaimed. "How many prisoners are on my ship? Is there a sex dungeon on it I don't know about and all?"

"Er, I don't know," Bunji said politely. "I only saw one room during my time onboard, and it was the hold. Although your First Mate is a bit… y'know."

"Him? Oh, he's in total denial."

"I'm not gay!" Allan hissed as he was led away.

"I found your pornography," the Captain said, "so I'm afraid we'll have to disagree."

"Please, Mr Kuraki," Tintin interrupted. "Continue."

"Oh. Where was I? Ah, yes. I was kidnapped trying to bring you a letter."

"Oh! That was you?"

"Yes. I wanted to warn you of the risk you were running. I have been on the track of this gang for over three years. They even operate in the far east. Incidentally, I believe we share some common friends: the Sons of the Dragon?"

Tintin grinned and nodded. His best friend Chang's adopted father – Mr Wang Chen-Yee – was one of the leading members of the Sons of the Dragon, an underground Chinese organization that battled the illegal trafficking of drugs throughout China and the far east. At first, the People's Republic backed them and let them do their work, but once the Sons of the Dragon became a powerful icon of freedom, and a rallying point for rebel freedom-fighters, they were exiled.

"Anyway," Bunji continued, "I was unsuccessful in my attempts to corner the gang. For the longest time we assumed that Captain Haddock was a brilliant actor and a criminal mastermind, although now I realise he is just a drunk and he knew nothing. No offence, sir."

"None taken," the Captain said despondently. "I didn't know 'owt."

"But one night a sailor named Herbert Dawes contacted me and claimed to have information that would be useful to my investigation."

"Old Herbie?" the Captain asked, puzzled. He scratched at his beard. "He was one of my crew. He was a good man."

"He was the man who drowned, yes?" Tintin asked.

"Yes, that's him. When we met, he was drunk but he claimed to be able to get me some heroin. To prove it, he showed me an empty tin which he said had held the drug, which his ship was bringing in to Europe. He offered to bring me a full tin, so we arranged to meet the next day. That night he died, and I was kidnapped shortly after."

Tintin shook his head. "Why did he have a label from his own crab tin, with the name of his ship written on it? That's what I don't understand."

"When I asked what the name of his ship was, I couldn't hear him over the music," Bunji explained. "He tore off a strip of the label and wrote it out for me. Then he put the label into his own pocket."

"Huh," said Tintin. "Conveniently explained, and all wrapped up neatly."

**x**

The next morning saw Tintin back at the hotel. He was out on the long deck that overlooked the cliffs and the harbour, the cool breeze washing over him as he leaned against the rail. His phone had been found on the _Karaboudjan, _and now he had the thankless task of going through it to find out what he'd missed. He had hundreds of missed calls and no sooner had he read one text than another popped up to take its place. Most of the news and tips were old by now – news was fast-paced and shifted direction every day – but he carefully made a note of some items that caught his eye.

He heard a door slide open and footsteps approaching. Snowy, who was sitting beside him, wagged his tail at the approaching visitor, so Tintin didn't bother to turn around. It was either the Thompsons or the Captain: Snowy would have reacted differently to a stranger.

"How do?" said the Captain as he leaned against the rail beside Tintin.

"I'm good," Tintin replied. "You?"

"Not bad. Not bad at all."

They were silent for a few moments. The _Karaboudjan_ was visible even from here. She was a large ship, and she had been isolated from the rest of the ships docked in the harbour. She was anchored at the closest end of the wharf to them, with two smaller police boats on either side. From their lofty position Tintin and the Captain could see teams of tiny people traipsing on and off. The police had impounded her and were going over her with a fine-tooth comb.

"Are you going back with her?" Tintin asked at last.

"Naaah," the Captain said. "They won't let me. They said they've to take her to some shipping yard where they can examine her closely. They've to go through everything."

"Are you going to get in trouble?"

"I don't see why." The Captain shrugged. "Allan's already said it was him, and that I knew nothing about it. And them two blokes… Thomson, is it? They said your statement cleared me."

"It did."

"Thanks."

"No problem."

The Captain sighed. "My black spirit," he muttered. "How very apt."

Tintin put his phone away and looked over at the Captain. "How's your spirit now?"

"Not doing so well, lad," the Captain admitted. "Looks like I'm off the water for a while."

"Where will you go? Back to England?"

"God no!" The Captain shuddered. "Too bloody rainy there this time of year. It's depressing. I like Belgium. I've been based there for years."

"Really? Where?" Tintin cocked his head to the side, surprised. He couldn't imagine the Captain in Belgium. He was so… well, he was so very _English._

"Antwerp," the Captain replied. "You look shocked."

Tintin shrugged. "I never thought about it. You sound too much like Sean Bean to live in Belgium."

"Shame I don't have his money, eh? I'd be sorted. Bang tidy."

"So what will you do?"

"Oh, this and that. This and that. I'll probably sign on with one of them big companies for a few months. By the time I'm finished with that, the _Karaboudjan _should be out of hock."

"You sound sad."

The Captain was silent for a moment, his eyes trained on the distant _Karaboudjan_ and the teaming, mass of people that were working on her. "I heard a lot of things today," he said slowly, "that I don't like. Herbert Dawes and me go a long way back. He came with me to the _Karaboudjan_ from another ship. He was loyal. Dead loyal, I thought. I didn't know his granddaughter had died. I didn't even know she was a junkie. The rest of the crew knew though, but I didn't."

Tintin stayed quiet: he didn't know what to say.

"That's how bad I've got," the Captain continued quietly. He looked down at his hands. He was rubbing them together compulsively. Back and forth, back and forth; rough skin scratching rougher skin. "My crew… A man who knew me for over ten years, couldn't come to me for help. For a chat. To share his problems. That's not a good captain, lad. That's a bad captain. That's a captain that deserves to lose his ship."

"You're too hard on yourself," Tintin murmured.

"Am I?" The Captain looked up and stared at him, his eyes fierce. "If you don't know your crew, lad, you've already lost 'em. If they don't know you, then they don't respect you, and a captain without respect is nothing. A captain that can't inspire loyalty has no crew. And that's a fact. Thundering typhoons, what a mess." He passed his hand over his face tiredly. "What a flaming mess."

"It's not too late to change," Tintin said gently.

"Aye, and it's not too late for breakfast either." The Captain slapped himself about his person. "Wallet, keys, phone. Come on: I'm buying. I'm bloody starving."

Tintin grinned and followed him along the decking to the steps that led down the side of the hotel to the front, and the road to the city below. It was a short walk and the day was fine. Snowy trotted alongside them happily.

"That's a good dog, that," the Captain said as they walked. "A fine dog."

"Thanks. I like him."

"Do you know where you find a one-legged dog?"

"No?"

"Where you left him."

"Ha! Good one."

"What do you call a women with one leg?"

"I don't know."

"Ilene. Get it? _I-lean!" _He nudged Tintin in the ribs a couple of times.

"Yes! I get it, I get it! How many more of these stupid jokes do you have?"

"Oooh, hundreds! Thousands, even!" The Captain slung his arm around Tintin's shoulders. "Let me tell you, my friend, of the time I found a butterfly with no wings. I poured Red Bull on him and _Blam!"_

"Red Bull gave him wings?" Tintin asked cautiously.

"No, it drowned. Poor bugger."

"I wish I let Allan kill me."

"Tintin my lad, this could be the start of a beautiful friendship…"

**::: FIN :::**

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note: <strong>Yes, I'm very aware that this is not like the film.

I know the book ends with the Captain appearing on the radio, with the classic scene of him taking ill from drinking a glass of water, but there were too many problems writing that up. For a start, it would have to be television instead of radio (in keeping with the updated theme), and I don't know enough about Belgium TV to know who the equivalent of Parkie is. Granted, with the Captain being from England (in my story/series), I could have put him on an English chat show, but with Michael Parkinson retired I couldn't think of a good enough chat show that deserves the Captain as a guest. I can't see my version of Archie appreciating spending any time with someone as irritatingly buoyant as Graham Norton. Besides, by the time I'd written the ending I went with, I liked it too much to add to it or change it.

There are several valid points for the Captain being Scottish and - historically and logically - they make perfect sense and fit with both history and the character. However, he's always had a Northern English accent in my head.

Well, it's been fun. I might take a week off before starting on the next one. Incidentally, the next one will **probably** be an original story leading off from where _Alph-Art_ ended. However, the subject matter is a bit weighty (and slightly angsty) so it will be posted under an **M** **Rating** (making it possibly the only story over in Tintin After Dark without hard-core sex, slash or the tag; 'MPREG'). It's a good old fashioned missing person case that the Captain and Tintin embark on, so keep an eye out for that because it won't show up on the main story page unless you deliberately search for M-rated stories.


End file.
